In a column several years ago
(October 23, 2009, “A Year of Living, Literally”), I wrote about Nina
Sankovitch, the blogger/writer/reader who made a vow in 2008 to read one book
every day for 365 days.
I wrote that I found Sankovitch a
wee bit crazy and I also confessed that I was extremely jealous of all the
‘time’ she apparently had on her hands to read all day long.
I gave her credit, however, for true
commitment when I discovered that her quest was born of an emotional need to
work through the grief of a sister lost to cancer and to heal during a year of
reading. I also learned that she had four children (all boys, ages 7 through
15) and during that “magical” year she still managed to be a mother, a wife, a
blogger and a friend.
When I wrote my column, Sankovitch’s
journey was nearing its end. A few days
later and at the end of that year she had read 365 books - one every single
day.
I’ve been told many times over the
past thirty years that the loss of a child is the cruelest loss. I know that
loss and so does my husband. I am
convinced, however, that no death is crueler than another. Losing a child,
losing a parent, a wife, a husband, a brother, a sister or a beloved member of
any family when it seems unfair is still that. Unfair and profoundly difficult.
Death leaves entire families hurting.
This is the devastating loss and
bewildering pain that Sankovitch experienced when her eldest sister,
Anne-Marie, passed away from bile-duct cancer in May 2005. “Tolstoy and the
Purple Chair: My Year of Magical Reading” (2011) is Nina Sankovitch’s account
of her year of working through her grief by reading those 365 books. It is a testament to sisterly love. It is a proof of an amazing commitment that
Sankovitch declared for herself. It is also a wonderfully woven narration of
the books she read and how they healed her.
Three years after her sister died,
Sankovitch was still bewildered and angry about the death. Life seemed
unfair. When she and her husband left
for a weekend of rest and relaxation in the summer of 2008, Sankovitch spent one lovely day reading while
her husband took a windsurfing workshop. He arrived back much later than they
had expected. Nina was amazed that in a
relaxed, unhurried and uninterrupted state she finished all four-hundred pages
of “Dracula” by Bram Stoker. It was that next day that she told her husband of
her intent to read a book a day for a year.
Understandably, her husband was
skeptical and so were her parents and most of her friends. The rules were that
each book must be one she had never read before and an author could not be
represented more than once in the year. The project also included posting a
review of one book each day online.
Nina visited her library often to
read or choose more books. Each time she
took home an armload of books, most were less than 400 pages long. The list (it
is included at the end of the book and online) is impressive. Most were written
by well-known authors and many were lesser-known works.
In “Tolstoy and the Purple Chair”,
Nina describes the depth of her relationship with her sister and how much Anne
Marie would have liked each book. Anne Marie was wise and loving, older and
aggravating. Throughout the book, Sankovitch admits that as a child she at
times disliked, feared, respected and revered Anne Marie. As an adult she
mainly adored her.
Some of the most intriguing elements
of the book are of the Sankovitch family’s history. Memories of family trips, recollections of
her parents’ former lives as Polish and Belarus immigrants, and stories of
sisterly squabbles and angst are sprinkled throughout. So are poignant memories of sisterly-love,
parental wisdom and incredible loss.
Every chapter of “Tolstoy and the
Purple Chair” was compelling and enlightening to me and I found myself
sometimes chuckling, sometimes overwhelmed with understanding. Sankovitch, an
attorney, was raising her children and not working when she made the decision
to read for a year. She readily admits
that she could not have done both. As it
was, she cut corners at home, assigning chores to her sons for the first time.
Family time, however, was sacrosanct and Sankovitch spent her time once school
was out through the bedtime hour attending to her family. It was often only
after 9 pm that she sunk into her purple chair in a corner of her study to read
under a good light.
An understanding and supportive
husband was, of course, a huge piece of the success of the year of
reading. Nina would carve out time to
drop her husband, Jack, off at the train station near their Connecticut home
for his trip to the city each day and she would sometimes race to the station
to pick him up before dinner. Yet, night
after night he helped out with homework and smiled in disbelief that his wife
was working her way through her goal.
On the cover of the book, author
Thrity Umrigar praises “Tolstoy and the Purple Chair” and declares that the
memoir “reminds us of the most primal function of literature – to heal, to
nurture, and to connect us to our truest selves.” Sankovitch healed and her book and her work
of literature nurtured me. I have no
doubt that in sharing her journey, many of its readers will connect to their
truest selves.
If you would like to reserve this
book, or its large print version, please call the Reference or Information
desks of the library, 781-799-0200.
