I'd Rather Be Reading by Guinevere De La Mare

Author:Guinevere De La Mare [Guinevere de la Mare]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Chronicle Books LLC
Published: 2017-04-08T04:00:00+00:00

Oh for a book and a shady nook,

either indoors or out,

with the green leaves whispering overhead,

or the street cries all about.

Where i may read at all my ease

both of the new and old,

For a jolly good book whereon to look

is better to me than gold.

—John Wilson (1785–1854)

Cheating

By Ann Patchett

I often say that the one thing I’m most likely to do on any given day is answer five questions for a newspaper in Australia, by which I mean I spend a lot of my time filling out forms. None of them are hard, many of them are from other countries, and for the most part they’re all pretty much the same. A very clever writer friend keeps a computer file of answers and just pastes them into different questionnaires. I keep meaning to be that organized.

This is one I did the other day. What was interesting about it was that it asked for my twenty-five favorite books. I’m often asked for my top three favorites, or top five, but never anything close to twenty-five. After the list, there were questions about favorite mysteries and favorite classics, which gave me room to add even more books to the list. The Great Gatsby is certainly one of my top twenty-five, but why use the space when I could work it in later? I was so surprised by the big number that I found myself really giving this project some thought. At first, twenty-five seemed like too many. Ten minutes later, it wasn’t enough. I remember in 2000 someone came out with a list of the one hundred greatest books of the century. I printed it out and made a point of reading the ones I’d neglected. I in no way think this list represents the greatest books of all time. I’m not even sure it represents my favorites. Do I really like The All of It better than Moby-Dick? Probably not, but I know I’d be more inclined to reach for it.

I was also surprised by my inability to add on books I love but had only recently read. I just finished William Trevor’s Fools of Fortune—a fantastic book. It felt like a top twenty-five, but wasn’t it too soon to commit? I also thought of the books that my friends have written that I love, but how could I include one or two without representing them all? So there are no friends on the list. There could be my favorite twenty-five books written by people I know, or my favorite twenty-five books written in the last twenty-five years. That would be a good one. I spent an hour trying to figure out which Toni Morrison was my favorite and got so exasperated with myself that I left her off. I cheated by including all four of Updike’s Rabbit Angstrom novels as one volume, and then listed the two Nancy Mitford novels most often published together as one. I included very little nonfiction. In Cold Blood was on there for a while and then fell off, as was Mikal Gilmore’s Shot in the Heart.

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