Tribute To Jonathan Livingston Seagull

The above photo by me (and enlarged several times) is of White Cheeked Tern and not of Seagulls.  I have been toying around with the idea of writing a few lines about Jonathan Livingston Seagull by the creative genius, Richard Bach for some time. One of the sweetest books I came across and enjoyed reading over & over again so much. Over the years I may have bought four of five copies of this spiritual and philosophical novella, the latest copy was for my daughter. The others were borrowed by friends and perhaps their friends borrowed from them! Who knows? This cycle might be going on as I write this ;-). Fine with me if they are not collecting dust!

Since I have been using photos shot by me in this blog, I desperately wanted to shoot a seagull, but the species the famous writer Richard Bach uses as a metaphor in his famous book is uncommon in Maldives. Let me use this image of our Gaadhooni or White Cheeked Tern for the time being. (Till I get to a bona fide photograph of one)

Richard Bach is 75+ as I write this, but he was a robust young man of 34 when he surprised the publishing world with a book about a seagull that wanted to explore flying! Publishers are not of the romantic brood or breed, but hardcore, thick-skinned unsmiling businessmen! And in the West everyone knows that gulls are scavengers, opportunists and have little or no ‘table manners’. No wonder when Bach sent out his manuscript, eighteen publishers rejected what later turned out to be a publishing phenomenon!  This thought-provoking little book sold more than a million copies in the first year (1970) alone and broke all hardcover sales records since Gone With The Wind written by Margaret Mitchell the same year Richard Bach was born! (Talk of coincidences!)

Born in Illinois USA, his whole life has been about flying, writting about flying, or around planes and gliders and para gliders which, he says is the closest to actual flying. Richard Bach claims to be a direct descendant of Johann Sebastian Bach, the seventeenth century legendary German composer who is perhaps one of the greatest composers of music of all time.

Another favourite of mine is Richard Bach’s “The Bridge Across Forever” in which he writes about how he met his 2^nd wife, Leslie Parrish and his concept of soul mates! (If you are of the romantic type, pls do read this!)

“JLS” contained fewer than 10,000 words & I have written over 444, but no publisher will buy this at 4.5% price of Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach! Life is not fair eh?

Thanks!