Sunday, April 20, 2014

Five books that changed Elizabeth Gilbert

Elizabeth Gilbert is the best-selling author of the memoir Eat, Pray, Love and the recent novel The Signature of All Things.

One of five books that changed her, as shared with the Sydney Morning Herald:
For Whom the Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemingway

When I was 14 years old, I went to my father one evening and asked him if he had any suggestions for something that I could read. I didn't want books for kids any more, and I told him as much. He went into our living room and looked on a high top shelf of his own bookshelf. I remember the silence as he considered. I loved how seriously he took my request. Then he took down Hemingway. "I think you can read this," he said. It felt like a literary rite of passage, from childhood into adulthood.
Read about another book on the list.

For Whom the Bell Tolls is among Michael Dobbs's six best books, John Mullan's ten best bridges in literature, Elmore Leonard's ten favorite books, John McCain's five best books about men in battle.

--Marshal Zeringue