In a strange room

more from the black book

"He has always had a dread of crossing borders, he doesn't like to leave what's known and safe for the blank space beyond in which anything can happen. Everything at times of transition takes on a symbolic weight, and power. But this too is why he travels. The world you're moving through flows into another one inside, nothing stays divided anymore, this stands for that, weather for mood, landscape for feeling, for every object there is a corresponding inner gesture, everything turns into metaphor. The border is a line on a map, but also drawn inside himself somewhere." -In a Strange Room, Damon Galgut

In a Strange Room is one of the most potent and emotionally fraught books I've ever read. After I finished I considered burning it because the stories left a dull dreadful loneliness in my mind. It's always funny to me how a certain order of words can evoke emotions that I've only ever felt while alone in the world, or never felt before at all. When this happens, when we are filled with the emotional details of a life we've never lived, we can all thank the mirroring part of our brains which allows reading to be a transference of experience.