the alchemy of reading, part I

"It is part of the alchemy of books that the written word rewrites itself on the reader and that one thing becomes another as it passes through various states of change while remaining itself. Don’t tell me that books are not mysterious – they are." --Jeanette Winterson

Last night, I settled into bed around eleven o'clock with the novel I started reading over the weekend.  It wasn't long before I realized my apartment had a curious sense of presence-- as if something were in the apartment apart from me and my dog.  On cue, Baxter started to bark in the other room.  Starting to get a little freaked, I got out of bed, put on my slippers, and cautiously opened the bedroom door.  I caught a glimpse of movement across the room and jumped out of my skin, then realized I was seeing my own reflection in the mirror hanging on the bathroom door, which I had left open.  Baxter barked again.  I told him to calm down and go to sleep (trying to convince myself of the same thing).  I went back to my bedroom, shut the door firmly behind me, climbed into bed, and slipped back into my book.  I read for another half hour or so and then, putting the closed book on my nightstand, quickly turned out the light and pulled the covers over my head.  If they can't see me, I thought, the same thought I've had since childhood, falling asleep under similar circumstances, they can't get me.

All that because I'm reading a book about vampires! The opening chapters of The Historian, by Elizabeth Kostova, lay the groundwork for the plot in teasing, thrilling chapters that so far include mysterious appearances and disappearances, and a father who is too terrified to recount the story of his encounters with Dracula to his daughter and so can only do it in short increments. The text is aware of its place in the scaffolding of the Dracula myth, from the fifteenth century to the present day, but it is no less unsettling for this acknowledgment.

This kind of terror is what Jeanette Winterson alludes to in her recent article in the Times.  In this essay, she observes that there are far too many books being published these days for anyone to read all of them, and indeed, quite few that are worth reading.  How is one to cut a swathe through the literary bracken?  The only real way to read, Winterson writes, is to "follow [your] eccentricities," wherever they may take you.  For example, here's where Winterson says her own eccentricities have recently led:

I have just been reading Captain Cook’s Journals, which made me read Robinson Crusoe again, which made me think about island narratives, and has run me towards Boswell and Johnson in the Hebrides, Marianne Wiggins’s wonderful novel John Dollar and to Diana Souhami’s award-winning Selkirk’s Island, which made me order Coconut Chaos, her new book on Pitcairn.

Isn't reading fun?

However, I have to disagree with her on one point: her outright dismissal of books on how or what to read, likening them to the "menu turistico beloved of nervous holidaymakers in foreign parts."  I take issue with this statement on several levels.

In the first place, my eccentricities have led me to the work of Alberto Manguel.  Here's how: While perusing in my local Barnes and Noble years ago, I came upon a paperback with an alluring name: The Mark of the Angel. I read the back cover and found it took place in Paris.  Sold.  An intellectual fascination (and something more, something more personal) with Nancy Huston was born. Last fall, hearing Huston would be on a panel at Festival America with Margaret Atwood and Edmund White (whose book on Paris I decidedly did not appreciate), I took my little self out to Vincennes to hear her.  And there beside her was a deeply philosophical Argentinian-Canadian, whose comments and works mark him as the heir to Borges and Benjamin.  "Je ne construis pas la vie sans lecture," he said; when we read, the book becomes part of our "bibliothèque intérieure."

It's true: if you want to know who someone is, you can tell a lot from the books they own.  And I don't mean this as an elitist judgment-- it's not to say that people who don't keep books aren't interesting people, or that people who buy and read chick lit aren't intelligent, but that much can be gleaned about that person's relationship to their mind and to ideas from their bookshelves. 

After the panel, I went to the book tent, where I bought Une histoire de la lecture(1996) and La Bibliothèque, la nuit (2006) as well as a short work on Borges and added them to my "to read" pile at home. (Manguel also has a book called A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflection on a Year of Books(2004) that I'm hoping to add to my library.)

A few months later, they're still in my "to read" pile; I'm thinking I may get to them in April or perhaps over the summer. Because I'm so interested in Manguel's understanding of literature, and the alchemical process of reading, this provides a good reason for me to read his reading diary.  If I respect a writer, such as Manguel, Winterson, Huston, then I will be interested to know what I can learn from their reading habits and journals that could in turn help my own reading and enlarge my understanding of literature and the world we inhabit.  And I'm sure that Manguel will lead me other places, to writers I haven't read, or to consider those I have in a different light. [Speaking of world we inhabit, Manguel now lives in a farmhouse in Poitou-Charentes.  I wonder how I might angle for an invitation...]

I suspect, however, that Winterson was not alluding to works like those of Manguel, but perhaps to something like How to Read a Poem, by Terry Eagleton (2006), Catching Life by the Throat: How to Read Poetry and Why, by Josephine Hart (2006) , How to Read and Why, by Harold Bloom (2001), or So Many Books, So Little Time: A Year of Passionate Reading, by Sara Nelson (2004), which best seems to prove Winterson's point: if there are so many books to read and not enough time to read them, why spend time reading about Nelson reading?

Which brings me to my second point, which will consider why we should in fact read Eagleton and Nelson on reading.  But I've gone on long enough for now; that's a post for another day.  To be continued...

Comments

[Alice]

Hey there Maitresse,

This is such a thought-provoking and fascinating post. You make such good points here, and I kept thinking while I was reading what you had to say that you were putting into words many of the things that have crossed my mind over the last few years... I've always loved reading, but my time spent working in a bookshop brought me even closer to literature and led me to read things that I might not have if I had not had the opportunity to work there.

You are a gifted writer, in so many ways, and I hope I will someday have the pleasure and honor of meeting you -- and I mean that in the most sincere way! You have led me to discover some great things in the time I have been reading your blog, and I've learned quite a bit from you. And you definitely played a role in my decision to finally start keeping a blog myself, although I know I don't share your writing talent -- I just wanted to get my thoughts out there, I guess.

I definitely agree that our "library" of books reflects a lot about us, and that somehow there is a link between our choices and who we are... My love of music and the piano led me to read Ketil Bjornstad's La Société des jeunes pianistes very recently, and I've realized in recent years how very singular our tastes can be in literature -- how a book that another person can rave about fanatically can just fall flat for me, whereas a book that touches home in several areas can pique my interest and take me away to another world. This is why I think I so love Milan Kundera and Haruki Murakami -- although their styles are ultimately completely different and they don't particularly have anything in common, they both have a way of sucking me in and captivating me. And yet I'm never able to convey to others my passion for these authors. I just can't seem to find the words...

I'm rambling here; I'm sorry. Allow me to sign off just by saying that you have done it again with this post; you have sent my mind wandering and have got me wondering what I will read next...

[Julie]

The exact same thing happened to me last night before I fell asleep. Except I'm reading an ethnographer's memoire of his fieldwork in Yemen. But substitute the cat for the dog and seriously, I had the same sentiment and the same reaction.

[Aralena]

eerily serendipitous, this fantastic post. two nights ago I was up-dating my Library Thing when I noticed that I had a lot (71, to be exact) of the same books as a certain "Hoaks." curious as to who my literary kindred spirit might be, I clicked on the link to her profile. landing on the first page of her library, something in my head clunked, my heart started beating a little faster - I knew immediately who Hoaks was within 10 books: she is my "ex-best friend," a term I feel ridiculous for using, but there you have it.

i browsed the rest of her library, feeling odd, like a peeping Tom, as if I’d somehow lost the right to such personal information when our friendship expired. some of the books reminded me of places and times spent talking about them, or about things entirely unrelated, in the presence of them. them being always the books.

The relevance books had in our relationship stuns me. at some point, I even think they symbolized the growing wedge between us as “best friends." Not having read, or having read and disliked a book that one of us had recommended proved the mortality of a once sisterly bond.

yes, there is much to be gleaned about a person - and two people, even - by the books they do or do not read, love, hate. clearly, though, they can't predict the longevity of a friendship!

[Misplaced]

I just want to find Waldo. Is that so much to ask?

[imaginair]

Sometimes, I had the same sensation that someone is just beside in the other room. Mostly, it is in a house beacause I always lived in an appartment. In a house, the danger can com from everywhere (doors, windows etc.). But I like to be in this situation because it makes me to do some extreme things. And I like some times to be in a dangerous situation.
Also in :
http://www.flickr.com/photos/90245244@N00/

[delphine]

I agree with Alice. Bravo!
I also believe that Art in general (music, dance, cinema, theatre et al) when it is good, when it touches something inside of us, we are elevated....we are lifted from the mundane and banality of everyday life. This is real magic.
Delphine

[Susie Vereker]

Congratulations on an interesting blog.

If you ever want a lighter holiday read, you could try my novel, Pond Lane and Paris. It does have some more serious underlying themes so you can read it at any level you want.
best wishes, Susie Vereker

[embrouillamini]

"The alchemy of reading", how beautiful. I've always thought of reading as much more potent and magical than theatre and film. And I too love the spiralling connections between authors.
May I ask why you did not enjoy Edmund White's book? I haven't read it yet but it's on my perpetual to-read list.

[maitresse]

Alice, thank you for your kind words. I would be honored to meet you as well. I also play the piano-- and I'm putting La Société des jeunes pianistes on my Amazon "liste d'envies cadeaux" now. And I'm midway thru Kundera's Le rideau, which is a real treat.

Aralena, you have inspired me to creat my own Library Thing page! But what a strange story about your literary kindred spirit... it does seem unfair that books should have been what forced you two apart. It's true that books and what we've read and enjoyed can be used to stand in for our essential being. But ought they to, I wonder, and if so, how? A subject well worth further musing, I think.

Embrouillamini, I think I took issue with White's tone, most of all. It seemed a bit too jaunty and cavalier. He also made some comments about Israel in that volume that I thought were utterly misplaced, not to mention offensive. But I don't have my copy of it here in Paris with me, so I'm not sure precisely what left such a bad taste in my mouth. I don't recommend it, but I also wouldn't dissuade anyone from picking it up.

[Annie]

This is a beautiful post--so much to digest. I have been musing around these ideas for some months now, but I don't think I could articulate them as well as you have. I'll be posting a response on my blog this week some time. I'm so glad I discovered this blog!

Cheers,
Annie
Reading is my Superpower
http://superfastreader.com