TEN TAGGED CHARACTERS, STANDING ON THE WALL…

Thanks to Mystic Margarita, the many characters who leap off the pages of books and take up residence in my head and heart, now have a reason to display themselves. And so here are ten random characters I have long-loved, straight off my memory-wall:

Hercule Poirot: Agatha Christie is one author I never get tired of re-reading and I just adore the pompous and poised Poirot – from his egg-shaped head with the genius grey-cells, to his shiny-patent shoes; from the dapper-waxed moustache to the heart which conceals a sneaky fondness for robust, overdressed femme fatales.

Rhett Butler: Another hirsute hero, though with a completely different appeal. Since Mystic Margarita has appropriated Heathcliff, I lay quick claim to Rhett – his swagger, his swarthy-manliness and his persistent passion for the fiesty Scarlett. The impact on my swooning senses was all the stronger because of Clark Gable’s dashing portrayal – it was the first time I realized that mustaches could be so sexy!

Bridget Jones: Totally feckless, totally madcap-romantic, obsessed with weight-issues, and a wholly freaky-funny peril-prone thirty-something damsel like you and me. What’s not to love? And to top it all, she gets to bed and wed a reincarnated Darcy (another fave-figure appropriated by Mystic…Gaaah!)

Precious Ramotswe: The founder of the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency – the first of its kind in sunny-sinful Botswana. I love her weight (she is ‘traditionally built’) and her wisdom (she solves her cases through observation, intuition, common sense aided by endless cups of bush tea and by diligently referring to her detection-guide-bible) and her wide, all-encompassing, placid acceptance of life.

Karna: The Mahabharata’s anti-hero is my favourite underdog: forever strong, unshakably brave, fiercely loyal, but always dealt a cruel hand by the Fates. I cannot stand Arjun, Righteousness’s poster-boy, and I always root for Karna, although he is Fortune’s eyesore and always at the wrong place at the wrong time – right down to his death when his chariot wheel gets stuck in the battlefield.

Seymour: Seymour was the unnamed narrator’s elder brother in J D Salinger’s short story, Seymour: An Introduction. He had an enormous impact on his brother’s (and my) psyche and he killed himself almost before (or because?) he was thirty. Way out!

Charlie Brown: It’s impossible not to love the round-headed kid, eternally optimistic at baseball, eternally incapable of expressing his feelings to the red-haired girl, and eternally heckled by the crabby Lucy and by his kid-sister. I chose him over Calvin (him and his tiger Hobbes), because I’m a sucker for wistful losers!

King Lear: Another loser who has impacted me greatly (sorry for the irreverence in placing him next to Peanuts). Lear’s impetuosity, his royal arrogance and ignorance, his very human foibles and hamartia, his ability to forgive, accept and embrace and his free-fall into unplumbed depths of suffering – this is the only Shakespearean play which ACTUALLY moves me to tears.

Harry Potter: I’m unashamedly Potter-maniacal. Brave and balanced but not boring, smart and sensible but not smart-alecky, I loved the whole trajectory of his growth through the seven Potter-books. And he is not a loser. He is the boy who lives. And wins.

Winnie-the-Pooh: So what if he’s not human? I love the Bear of Little Brain and the Big Stomach always rumbling for honey. I love his winsome-ness and his wonder-at-such-simple-things and his whole-new-perspective-on-things. Once he entered Rabbit’s hole, ate too much honey and got stuck while coming out of the hole. That’s the way he is, forever stuck in my heart.

This list can actually go on and on and on…Thanks MM. Anybody who wishes to make their own list, please consider yourself tagged. The pleasure of reading will be mine.