@@LifeLessonsFromBooks He mentions it on one of his final interviews actually. (on youtube actually) He is very interesting guy and fantastic musician. Happy reading also! :)
The double bass by Susskind is a great little book about a double bass player. Was turned into a play, too. Like PERFUME the book is a strange obsessive thing. Which is what I like about Susskind in fact.
This is one of my favorite books because of how amazing the descriptions are. I find it hard to picture things in my brain, but I feel like I'm transported to this world, whether Suskind is describing a fish market or a perfume shop or a dirty cave. It really helped inspire my own writings. I also love how none of the characters are really likable, we have an antihero and an unclean, unfriendly society that even he as a pretty bad person can't fit into.
Thanks for the review. I just finished reading it once and I agree, throughout the read I was completely disgusted by Grenoille. The themes also were disgusting. Throughout half the novel I felt pity for him because he just couldn't seem to find his place, and his behavior almost seems justified by the way he's been treated in the novel. However, past the half way mark I began to develop a disgust for him and everything he represented. Was his behavior justified because of his origins, ie his mother not giving a shit as well as the people he encountered? Good review, thanks!!
Thanks for watching and sharing your thoughts. Yeah, the first time around I liked the book, second time? It was like I read a completely different book. 🤣
Ah no 🤔 but that’s because I had (have) no idea about the manufacture of perfume! You’d assume a writer would have to have done some research on the topic but he had an utterly clueless reader in me on that topic. Everything he wrote sounded real so it was good enough for me. 🤣 Except for that ending which was a bit “Whoa! What just happened there?!” 🤣
I'm an English teacher and I use excerpts of this in my lessons (carefully selected, of course) as the olfactory descriptions are unlike anything I've ever read. He describes a new born baby's feet as smelling like smooth warm stone or fresh butter. ..who would think of that but how accurate it is. Incredible story and what an anti-hero Grenouille is!
I agree that his descriptions were fantastic. With my first reading of this book, I do recall thinking that it was the first book that woke up my sense of smell while reading. Thanks for watching and sharing your thoughts.
Love your review - I’m a huge fan of the book. I think I might give it a second read to get a deeper/fuller understanding of the themes. I find a beauty in what he does throughout the book, though I think my personal qualms with society have influenced my opinions in a different way than yours has. So interesting how each person can feel so strongly about the book in different ways depending on their own circumstances. I specially resonated with the chapters where he became increasingly more disgusted with society and eventually isolated himself in the mountains. I got chills at certain points - his efforts to remain in the cave within his own mind - how calculated his time spent outside the cave was - fantastic. I’m a huge fan of Kurt Cobain and I have a fascination with his mind, I heard that this was his favorite book and that he carried a copy with him for years, and that aspects of it have influenced his creative choices. That section of the book, the isolation, really all clicked into place and I felt a connection not only to the character but to cobain as well which was chilling. I just know he resonated with that part of the book heavily. Thanks for the review, I loved hearing your perspective.
Wow thank you so much for watching and responding with your thoughts. This is fascinating for me. As it was my second reading, it was completely different to my first. I wonder if I read it again, and based on what is happening in society too, whether I’d feel differently again? 🤔 I wasn’t aware Kobain carried that book. I used to carry Catcher In the Rye in my bag for three months after reading it three times consecutively and never wanting the story to end. I became obsessed with that book. Books speak to us at certain times of our lives. Thanks again and I appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts too.
I love this book but by the end I was bored, as my hope for a sudden contemplative shift toward love at the -end- creating a ripple in grenouille was lost. The narrator had become a bit exasperated in my opinion along with me. How disaffected and how untouchable the protagonist is is so sad. Which, ultimately is the point. He got what he desired and then decided it was not worth the expense of civility.
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts here. It was my second reading of this book and remember thinking how different - and how I perceived him to be - compared to the first time I read it. I had similar thoughts to you on my second read.
May I advise you to read the Bible. Not that this is really necessary, even as an atheist I know enough about the Bible. And then read this book one more time or perhaps even better watch the movie. Tom Tywker has turned it into a visual spectacle and incorporated at least a hundred hints from Suskind's book. The easiest are the 12 bottles and 1 separately on the right side, should Suskind have made it so easy to place this bottle in the middle? We can only ask ourselves one question: is Jean the good one or the bad one? I say the good one, he wants to give paradise to the people. But unfortunately they are not ready for that yet. Too many sinners, a square full, an earth full? Jean-Baptiste's time will come. And this guideline runs throughout the book and movie and gives you chills that you don't know where they come from. But your subconscious actually knows. Greetings from the Netherlands.🌷🌷
Thank you. Well that’s certainly an interpretation I hadn’t considered that’s for sure. 🤔 I have not seen the movie yet. You reminded me to seek it out. I’m intrigued now….
@@LifeLessonsFromBooks Thank you for the response. Jean Baptist's life story is quite similar to that of Christ and parts of the Bible. Like honors your father and mother. Well, what can I say about the birth of our best friend? He didn't honor her, he's only human, the crying. Christianity is not always easy to follow, it is sometimes full of contradictions and I believe that Suskind has made good use of this. All employers and/or owners who exploited and treated him brutally die. Romans 12:19, JP doesn't have to do anything to get retribution. If JP is eaten, he wants it himself, just like Christ voluntarily went to the cross. I can really recommend the film, it is a good reflection of the book and perhaps makes it easier to see the depth of the story. The book and the film are full of references, but it seems like we don't want to see them and I think that's brilliant. Tom Tywker turned it into a beautiful spectacle and wrote the music together with 2 friends, with the absolute highlight, meeting Laura. The best actors in the world participate in it. Have fun watching and I hope to get a response to this again.🌷🌷
My book group chose to read this, we haven’t read it yet, but it seems like a really near book, despite how gruesome it seems. I look forward to reading it and your review is awesome!!
First of all, great review!! :D I admittedly haven't fully experienced this book, since I heard an audiobook for this read (physical books are getting real expensive in my country but still) and I find I have very many mixed feelings about it. For the most part I felt entranced by the descriptions of odors and perfumes, the writes does a great job I think at really immersing the reader in the scene without being too pedantic. On the themes of young girls and older men continuously accosting them through some other parts of the book...I now get how its more metaphorically a desire to attain that quality, that 'innocence' these girls possesed and that, in a misguided assumption, the protagonist thought was subconsciously the reason why they were loved by the world and he despised. Even so, made me wanna quit the book a few times, which may actually attest to the merit in its writing for being so profoundly disturbing. Pretty much wouldn't read again but I far from hate it
My first reading of the book I was mesmerised. The second not so. You’re right about the disturbing writing. It somehow came more alive for me the second time I read this!
im 14 and i want to read this book but idk if i should because im afraid it might have some negative effect on me, what are your suggestions. should i read it or not?
Hello and thank you for watching and asking this question. I would say that ultimately, it’s up to you however it’s really how you approach it. Like any book really. First of all, the violence on tv, series and movies nowadays is far far worse than what is in the book. You will find that this book is written beautifully and evokes you to imagine scenes. Sometimes our imagination is what is scary the most. Ultimately, approach the book objectively. Read it like you genuinely want to understand what the author was saying, why he was writing it that way, what was the message, how the character is portrayed? I think if you approach a book like this critically and objectively, you have an arm’s length away from the scenes. Ultimately this is a book you can read again and again. It’s not scary but it does have adult themes. Check out some other reviewers and see what they say but ultimately it will be your call. There are far far far worse books out there and I wouldn’t put this book into this category at all. Good luck with your reading journey.
In Germany we read the book "Perfume (Das Parfum)" in school. We all read that when we were students and it didn't hurt anyone at all. And at the age of 14 you should know for yourself which movies and books you want to watch and read.
