#13: The Traveling Bookbox Show

February 2, 2025

“I cannot remember the books I’ve read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Dioramas – scenes-in-shoeboxes that often try to capture the essence of books – are a popular format for school book reports in the U.S. I didn’t even know what a diorama was until I moved to California from London in 2011, where someone told me I make grown-up versions for a living.

In 2016 I decided to dedicate some time to this old-school art. I wrote a list of the books I’d loved. I reread some, nearly ruined a few by watching the movie version, all the while looking for particular scenes and feelings that had stayed with me over the years.

The result was the The Traveling Bookbox Show, a collection of book-themed dioramas that was exhibited on the shelves of independent bookshops in San Francisco, Portland and London in 2016.

From The Hampstead and Highgate Literary Festival in London to the legendary Powell’s Books in Portland, it was my delight to sneak these sparkling boxes onto book shelves, often beside the very books they depicted.

I’m sharing my ten most formative books from the collection, ones that opened new horizons for me and have stayed with me to this day. Can you think of your top ten? Please let me know if you can!

The full collection of bookboxes can be viewed here.

1. The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera (1984)
This is the last remaining bookbox in my possession, hanging above Ralph and my heads in bed.

In this Glass Cathedral (above) I’ve tried to capture Tomas and Tereza’s last evening of life in a hotel dive bar in the Czech countryside. This simple scene has stayed with me since I first read the book in 1994, perhaps because it so plainly illustrated Kundera’s title… That one could have a perfectly ordinary day, then disappear having not known it was your last.

2. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)
Kathy in her boarding school dormitory, dancing alone to her favourite song “Never let me go”. A teacher at the door, unseen, weeps at the sight. My pity for Kathy, and my self-pity… my gut still wrenches… sometimes we don’t even know exactly what we are weeping for…goodness this book made an impression.

3. The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks (1985)
Ah, I have my own story to add to Sack’s collection! When I awoke from a three day coma in 1993, I had complete amnesia. I couldn’t fix words to things, faces to identities (including my own – I saw myself in the mirror and thought “she’s got a great tan!”), even the distinction between organic and inorganic became unclear – my parents looked computer-generated.

When the amnesia cleared, I found my condition utterly fascinating, and thought of this book, which I’d read only weeks before. In this collection of medical case studies, Sacks examines people whose particular capacities are stripped away – physical, linguistic, psychological – questioning what is then left of our identities, of our humanity?

It’s Sack’s genius to show how even if our identities are contingent on biology, we are no less soulful or mysterious for that.

4. Perfume by Patrick Süskind (1985)
The story of a 18th Century French murderer, a hideous tick on the body of humanity, but with an exquisite sense of smell and an inexorable drive to create the perfect scent, at any cost.

5. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1866)
Although the book is a brilliant stream-of-consciousness journey for Raskolnikov, I wanted to capture this one moment at the centre of the drama, its terribleness and clarity, the eye of the hurricane.

6. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (2001)
The passion and drama of an opera, combined with the stillness of a story where time and language have become almost irrelevant, transported me – with Roxanne Cox, Mr Hosokawa, Gen and Carmen – to a place of extraordinary love.

7. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1967)
I happily recreated the Insomnia Plague of Macondo, which causes the village to lose their memories. To facilitate a kind of remembering, the inhabitants of the town begin to label everything; a brilliant concept reminiscent of an Oliver Sacks case study. The plague is finally cured when Melquíades the gypsy returns to Macondo bearing an antidote – and the first camera Macondo has ever seen – it being the way we fix memories to this day.

8. West with the Night by Beryl Markham (1942)
I loved this autobiography by British-born Kenyan aviator, racehorse-trainer and good old-fashioned adventurer Beryl Markham. Why am I so nostalgic for an Africa long since past? Because, living and traveling there, one captures fragments, and books like these transport you – the light, people, the possibility, the warthogs.

9. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (1960)
“…you never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them“. Atticus’s words to Scout have echoed in the hearts of millions of children and adults around the world, including mine. I think of those shoes quite often, quite literally – slightly too big, worn-out, clumsy, walking as best we can.

10. Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren (1945)
Pippi, beyond her braids, mismatched socks and flair for the outrageous, made an impression on me because she somehow opened windows into a grown-up world. A heroic AND tragic absent father… who was King of the Cannibals! A girl who had the strength and confidence to lift a horse!

This collection has been on-the-shelf, as it were, for a good few years, but I still have a to-do list including the three books below, all read in the last year. My personal recommendations to you!

The Tzar of Love and Techno by Anthony Marra (thanks Al!)
How is this book not a Pulitzer-prize winning smash hit bestseller? I cannot recommend this book more highly. If you read it please let me know what you think.
North Woods by Daniel Mason (thanks Nix!)
Ok this was book of the month in many bookshops recently, it’s bloody brilliant.
How to be Both by Ali Smith (thanks Tom!)
This one requires a leap of faith and trust, because you don’t always know what’s going on. But my goodness what an alchemical, 3-dimensional feat of idea-exploration and storytelling.

It’s not that a book can ever really be captured in a box. In truth as I looked back, what often dawned was a realisation of how wrongly I remembered the details of each book, but how truly I recalled the lasting impression. So my slightly-wrong-book-memories have nonetheless woven their magic and meaning into the making of my worldview.

Happy reading!

Love Lisa

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