The ideal library
You may have noticed that at the end of each interview, I generally asked my trademark question:
“Let’s say you were to spend the rest of your life alone, on a desert island, with only one book in your pocket… which book would you choose?”
The answers ran the gamut from philosophical works to practical ones, with everything from poetry, Bildungsroman and science fiction in between. They always gave me priceless insight into the people I was speaking to.
As for me, I never found a definite answer to this tricky question… During the world tour, I had brought The Odyssey by Homer but only read a few pages, too taken up by my writing. What’s more, I often read it out loud to Jérémie, who almost systematically went to sleep lulled by “rosy-fingered Dawn”… He however read to me, in bits and pieces, Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche, which gave us food for thought throughout the entire trip.
Today, I still can’t answer my own question, hesitating between All the Names by José Saramago and the Petit Larousse French dictionary… for a start!
The answers of the people I interviewed have helped me form an imaginary “ideal library” which, since our return, Jérémie and I have been slowly piecing together for real. Surprisingly, it is not as international as I had assumed it would be. Regardless, today I would like to present you this “ideal library” which, by the fresh glimpses it provides of the people I met during these Excursions into the World of Books, seems to be a nice goodbye present…
Foundational texts
- John McGlynn, publisher in Jakarta (Indonesia), chose La Galigo. “At an estimated 6,000 pages, it may be the longest book in the world.”
- Pinaki Mazumdar, publisher and bookseller in Kolkata (India), chose the Bhagavad Gita. “The sixth part of the Mahabharata.”
- Trasvin Jittidecharak, publisher in Chiang Mai (Thailand), chose The Iliad by Homer. “Unlike The Odyssey, which only deals with questions of family, The Iliad nurtures ideals.”
- And lastly, The Bible was mentioned by Daniel Eduardo Arroyo, librarian in Salta (Argentina) and Rebekah Mak, printer in Singapore.
Nineteenth-century English-language fiction
- Sandra Thibodeaux, Director of the NT Writers’ Centre in Darwin (Australia), chose A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (1859). “Bearing in mind that Dickens portrays the Paris and London of 1793, while Munkara chooses a twentieth-century Aboriginal setting for her novel, can you see what Sandra chooses to get away from it all?”
- Ugandans Lillian Nyakana, an employee at NABOTU, and Ariho Ivan Mujorizi, bookseller, both chose, without consulting each other first, Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain (1876). “My mother, who was always a great reader, had received her copy of the novel at school during the 1970s. In fact, she still has that copy.”
- Alejandro Cerda, psychoanalyst and publisher in Mexico City (Mexico), chose Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (1865). “He might prefer the rare edition illustrated by Dali, which adds the complexity of its illustrations to the complexity of the plot…”
Twentieth-century English-language fiction
- Walter Bgoya, publisher in Dar Es Salaam (Tanzania), chose The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway (1952). “This story of endless patience reminds him of his own obstacle-ridden life course.”
- Balsam Saad, publisher and bookseller in Cairo (Egypt), chose Animal Farm by George Orwell (1984). “It rightly raises the question: ‘What really happens when we believe we are doing things right?’”
- Sherif Bakr, publisher and bookseller in Cairo (Egypt), chose Life of Pi by Canadian author Yann Martel (Alfred A. Knopf, 2001). “He would certainly be able to extricate his way out of the most contorted situations, don’t you think?”
- C.D. Moulton, writer in Almirante (Panama), chose Phoenix Tales by American author Gregory Banks (Wheelman Press, 2008). “A touchstone of the science fiction genre.”
Other novels
- Janet De Neefe, director of the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (Indonesia), chose Love in the Time of Cholera by Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez (Trans. Edith Grossman, Vintage Books, 2007). “Meet violence with hope.”
- Esther Baum-Schaller, bookseller in Frankfurt (Germany), chose One Last Ride on the Merry-go-round by Italian author Tiziano Terzani (HarperCollinsIndia, 2008). “The narrator, suffering from cancer, sets off on a voyage to other civilisations, exploring treatments in other countries and subsequently discovering the richness of foreign cultures.”
- Lauri Luciernaga, cartonera and poet in Mexico City (Mexico), chose On Heroes and Tombs by Argentinian author Ernesto Sábato (Trans. H.R. Lane, Jonathan Cape Ltd 1990). “The story of a tormented love.”
Poetry
- Jacques Aubergy, publisher and bookseller in Marseille (France), chose Mexican author Sor Juana Inès de la Cruz. “Mystic, intimate poems.”
- Mauricio Souza, publisher in La Paz (Bolivia), chose Cesar Cerruto. “A 20th-century Bolivian poet.”
- Yaxkin Melchy, cartonero and poet in Mexico City (Mexico), chose La Vida Nueva by Chilean author Raul Zurita. “A work recounting a fascinating experiment the author performed in the 1990s, looking for poems in the shapes of the clouds over New York.”
- Michael Goh, freelance sales rep in Singapore, chose an anthology of world poetry in English. “After all, as a Singaporean, I like that feeling of being at a crossroads.”
Biographies
- Guillermo Quijas, publisher and bookseller in Oaxaca (Mexico), chose the Memoirs of Pancho Villa by Martin Luis Guzman (Trans. V.H. Taylor, University of Texas Press, 1976). “The story of another man of action!”
- Manar Badr, librarian in Alexandria (Egypt), chose Hypatia by Arnulf Zitelmann (untranslated into English). “As a pagan in the Christian era, a woman amongst men, and a philosopher of uncomfortably progressive views, she was eventually assassinated.”
Philosophy
- Guido Indij, editor in Buenos Aires (Argentina), chose A Thousand Plateaus by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari (Trans. Robert Hurley, Mark Seem and Helen Lane, Penguin Classics, 2009). “I like Oscar Wilde’s reply, that the best book to take to a desert island would be a blank one, with all the pages yet to be written.”
- Andras Berkes-Brandl, publisher in Blackheath (Australia), chose Es mind én voltam egykor (untranslated into English) by Milàn Füst (1957-58). “The book is a sort of intimate, philosophical diary, quite enigmatic and brilliant. I always have a copy on me.”
- Alvaro Lasso, publisher in Lima (Peru), chose The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Trans. Katharine Woods, Harcourt Brace and Company, 1971). “Another publisher who isn’t likely to get bored any time soon, even if he were deserted on a desert island…”
A children’s book
- I love U by God (Scandinavia Publishing House, 2011) by Stella Maris Stutina was mentioned by its own author (Indonesia). “This book changed my life.”
A few practical books
- Dion P. Sihotang, publisher in Jakarta (Indonesia), chose The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Dr Steven R. Covey (Simon & Schuster Ltd, 2004). “A personal development guide with advice on improving your life, work methods and inter-personal skills…”
- Stuart Laurence, editor in Sydney (Australia), chose his own publishing house’s Weather Encyclopedia. “To be able to forecast the island’s weather.”
A classic answer
Of course, there were also those who had no idea which book to choose, my favourite answer being from Kohwai, enfant terrible of Malaysian publishing: “On a desert island, I wouldn’t have any time to read. I would be too busy looking for Eve!”
Other ideas at BiblioMonde
If you are looking for other ideas for reading or travel, I heartily recommend browsing the website of Parisian non-profit BiblioMonde, which offers categorised, annotated book lists on countries of the world, without separating the history books from fine literature, travel books, cookbooks or children’s books. It’s an original approach which is all too rarely taken by libraries and bookshops. Founder Bruno Teissier explains his approach: “The idea came to me when I had to scour all the aisles of my neighbourhood’s largest bookshop to track down publications on Portugal, the country where I was travelling that year”.
And you?
And that is the end of our blog. But it is still open to comments, so please feel free to leave one!
How about you? What book would you choose if you could take only one to a desert island?



My thanks go to Elise for entrusting me her classes for this endeavour. And thanks to the students for all getting into the writing activity!
The song of the birds, the faraway forests on the bank remind me of another time, my childhood. In the distance, I hear a noise, a noise that is not of this world… A car horn! That wakes me up, I come back to reality, here, lying on a low wall. And my old bones are aching… I’ve shaken off this beautiful dream, I am awake.
I am dreaming that, while meditating after a prayer, the world in which I live disappears. I find myself in a world where everything is green and luxuriant, then suddenly, before my eyes appears the Buddha, he who attained the summits of perfection, he who attained all. He tells me that finally, I also know everything, and that my patience and meditation have elevated my spirit and life to a state of perfection. Henceforth, I am a minor deity, only I wonder how people will know who I am. That’s when I hear in my head a voice calling me. I believe I am being prayed to, but that’s when it all comes crashing down and the feeling of the cold floor tiles chills me. I am awake.
I thought my delivery run was taking forever and that the sun would never set; it was always blinding my eyes. That’s when someone flagged me down. I stopped and she said: “What are you doing here?” I answered her: “I’m making a delivery.” Then she asked me to whom I was making the delivery. And I answered: “To Father Christmas. What I’m carrying are the letters from children all over the world.” I took off again, and after three hours on the road, saw a signpost where it was written, “House of Father Christmas”. When I arrived at his house, I opened the door and saw someone sitting on a chair, dressed as Father Christmas. It was me! That is when I woke up.
I will escape my daily drudgery wandering around this magnificent Malaysian city, which I will someday get out of bound for a new world. I’ll enter the life of these people painted on the wall of the street where I sleep every night, I’ll make Malaysian people laugh, I’ll help them fight against poverty. Once all the inhabitants of this country are won over by my humour and kindness, I’ll wake up.
I am dreaming that I am waking up in a pyramid with a pickaxe hanging from my belt. We are building a pyramid for the Pharoah. The work is so hard, I ache all over. Once night falls, I go home to my family. After eating, I go to sleep and dream that I am in a future world with chariots that roll along by themselves and picture frames that broadcast moving images, and then I wake up with a start, since someone knocked at the door. Quickly, I wake up since the policeman beside me wanted to know if I was all right, since he couldn’t see my chest moving. I wake up.
From way up there, I see the film shoot and glimpse the famous actor Shahrukh Khan. I keep up my flight until the Himalayas, where I try to reach the peak, in vain. With this disappointment, I decide to fly over the Ganges from its source to its finish. I see cranes, zebus and herds of hippopotamuses. Finally, I want to go back home to Varanasi, but along the way, I fly into a large building. The shock wakes me up and here I find myself in my own bed. It was only a dream.




























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