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“I love this book,” I said to Tim while attempting read in a moving car, something that, to my intense frustration, I have never quite managed to do without wanting to vomit (thankfully I can read on a moving train, which makes my long commute more bearable).
“Listen to this,” I said, quoting page one (yes, page ONE!!).
Hours later, not long after the genesis of Francis Wells’ idea, the party would meet a premature death with a cloud of plaster dust covering the Gardner’s guests, as well as a dessert table graced with spun-sugar Giacomettis and the life-sized sculpture of Michelangelo’s David, whose penis had all evening been dripping syphilitically.
“And this!” I raved.
By ten p.m. there had been three slideshows – one of which, “Hop Art: A Portfolio,” projected photos of Bunny’s own work onto the ballroom walls, interspersed with a series of dinner courses as carefully presented and unsatisfying as Francis’ wife.
“I didn’t want to love it, but there it is, how could I not?”
“Don’t you want to love all books?” he asked, confused.
I pondered his question; certainly its a valid one. When it comes to reading, as with the rest of life, I’m total cynic. I certainly don’t expect to love all books – an inordinate amount of what is published is trash, or boring, or overdone (or pleasant and inoffensive, but forgettable). But there are those who allege that cynics are disappointed idealists. Maybe. If it were not true that a vast majority of published works are just plain mediocre, if we did live in an ideal world, would I really want to love every book I read?
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