How does one decidedly say if a book is a classic? I read The Alchemist and The Kiterunner and have now grown weary of these ‘modern day classics’ as they are called. Hosseini, the author of The Kiterunner, will employ only the simple past tense; he will write: ‘He went there, sat, ate, kissed her cheek, got up, and came back’ instead of ‘he went there and sat down. When he had eaten, he kissed her cheek, then got up and came back.’ The book is a recall written in the first person and not once in the entire length of the novel do you come across the past perfect tense! Some may put forth the lame argument: ’simplistic writing’, but insofar as a reader, a customer has the right to be judge, so I adjudge Hosseini as not having a good command over the language, besides reading monotonous. The plot is good, but not out of the box. The language employed is good, but could have been better; he reads more like a great blogger than a good writer. The book is good, but certanly not a classic. I could never understand the greatness of The Alchemist. Again, the book is good, certainly not great or a classic.
Having read The Alchemist, I did not regret buying it off the pavement, and the same goes for The Kiterunner. The writer weaves a tale arnd his homeland, Afghanistan, and one gets to learn a thing or two about the chequered past of the land. But, if one has to learn a lesson or two about writng about one’s homeland, one’s mitti, then I have not read a better writer than Premchand.
Now, no more of those godforsaken “modern day classics”. Rather judge a book by its movie and read one of those American writers, than trust these ‘modern day classics’. And rather read ‘good ol’ classics like Dickens’, Jane Austen’s, Tolkein’s, than these “one-book-wonders”.
