Challenges for 2011

I'm not a big fan of reading challenges, but there are some out there that I know I'll completely without even thinking about it, so I figure I may as well sign up.

The first of these is the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge. I seem to read historical fiction no matter what, and I'd kind of like to read more of it consciously, so this seems like a good challenge to sign up for. I'll be doing the Daring & Curious reading level, which is five books, though there's a chance I'll read more than that.

I also want to do the Bibliophilic Books Challenge again this year, but I haven't found a link to it yet.

Library: An Unquiet History

I heard about Matthew Battles's Library: An Unquiet History from Buried in Print, who read it for the Bibliophilic Books Challenge (for which it is also my fourth book). Somehow the book struck me enough to immediately go and order it from the library. It thus arrived, and I have now read it.

My first three books about books this year were stories (the Christopher Morley books and 84, Charing Cross Road), so it's a nice change to read a nonfiction book about books. Every single time, I forget how much I love this kind of nonfiction. Matthew Battles divides his story of libraries into more or less chronological chapters, beginning in ancient times, ending with the Internet. Apart from this chronological framework, each chapter has certain themes, such as book burning, library controversy, public libraries, and the destruction of books. The whole book is tied together by its constant questioning of what a library is, what people throughout history have believed to be the ideal form of the library, and what kinds of collections, intended as such or not, can functionally be called libraries.

Library sometimes feels disjointed, and I believe parts of it were previously published separately. It comes across as everything Battles wants to say about libraries (he's a librarian at Harvard), collected into one place, whether it entirely belongs there or not. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it's all very interesting, but the book could have used a little more editing. Despite that, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. Battles writes well--sometimes a little fancifully, but this is never dry nonfiction. As the book's subtitle suggests, the story of the library is really very dramatic, full of wars, burnings, bombings, political and social prejudice, and literary controversy. Despite this, one suspects that in the wrong hands, a book about libraries could still come out very quiet and dull. Matthew Battles's are not the wrong hands. There are stories here of the impressive lengths to which people will go to read, and to prevent people from reading, and it's all very often surprisingly moving. Books and libraries are powerful, and Battles clearly understands this and has managed to transmit it. Helpfully, he obviously loves libraries and is well read on the subject.

Near the end of the book, Battles discusses how the Internet fits into the story of the library. He says, "The digital objects of today are the incunabula of a not-too-distant tomorrow..." (pg 212). Thanks to Sam Starbuck we have a word for such digital incunabula--extribulum, which you can (and totally should) read about here. I get rather a lot of glee out of connecting other things to Sam Starbucks' work, so it was lovely to see this in Library. It's fascinating to me to consider the relationship between books and the Internet, and it's always good to see writers treating this subject well, since it's so often written about with a certain amount of histrionic the-world-of-books-as-we-know-it-is-ending/the-internet-is-making-us-stupider sentiment. Plus, I like to think my blog is an extribulum.

So, I thought this book was fun, informative, and intelligent, and I very much recommend it.

The Haunted Bookshop

After finishing Christopher Morley's Parnassus on Wheels, I emailed my father to get him to find me the sequel, The Haunted Bookshop, in the matching edition. He very promptly did so, and I have now read it.

For all it is a sequel, The Haunted Bookshop is very different from its predecessor. Parnassus was written from the point of view of Helen, which made it a much more charming book, because she was such an ordinary woman, but open-minded towards having such an unusual adventure. The Haunted Bookshop, on the other hand, is not narrated by any character. Helen and Roger have now opened up a bookshop in Brooklyn, and Mr. Chapman, a very rich friend of Roger's, has sent his daughter, Titania, to work in the bookshop in order to reverse the ill effects of a finishing school. Also on the scene is Aubrey Gilbert, a young advertiser who first enters the Haunted Bookshop with a mind to managing Roger's advertising. Roger, of course, doesn't believe in any advertising he has to pay for.

Aubrey and Titania rather take over the show from Helen and Roger. This book has as many adventures as Parnassus, but they are of a rather darker, less whimsical nature. Whereas Parnassus shows a world before World War I, The Haunted Bookshop is set just after the war, and this has a very noticeable effect on the tone and content of the book. That's not to say there is not still whimsy in this story, and Roger Mifflin is still preaching the love of books, but there is a wider view of the world here. The less comic nature of this book probably has something to do with the fact that the travelling Parnassus wagon itself does not appear here, as it was so inherently comic.

This book is wonderful, but not quite as lovable as Parnassus on Wheels. Still, it's well worth the read, especially to get a further view of such wonderful characters as Roger Mifflin and Helen.

Another nod to the Bibliophilic Books Challenge, for which this is my third book, meaning I've completed the first level of the challenge, Bookworm. Since I've already started another book that qualifies, I guess I'm aiming for the next level up, which entails six books.

84, Charing Cross Road

Happy Father's Day!

While I was eating breakfast yesterday morning my father came home from the library, and said he'd bought me a book (not from the library, of course, but there's a bookshop in between). He bought me a book the day before, too, and at this point every time he says he's bought me a book I say, "Oh, dear." Both books were thoroughly welcome, though. Evelyn Waugh's Put Out More Flags, which I've been vaguely meaning to read, and Helene Hanff's 84, Charing Cross Road, which I've already read, but really ought to own.

And then I sat down and read it again. It's only 97 pages, but it took a while and I didn't mean to and I was supposed to be showering and getting on with the day. It was, however, thoroughly enjoyable.

I tend to think of 84, Charing Cross Road as a novel, as fiction, but of course it isn't. It's a collection of letters between Helene Hanff, a writer living in New York with a taste for out of print books which can't be found affordably any where in New York, and Frank Doel, employee of the Marks and Co. Bookshop at 84, Charing Cross Road, London, where Helene's desired books can be bought. Also making appearance are other employees of the bookshop, Frank Doel's wife, and his next door neighbour. The correspondence spans twenty years, beginning in 1949. Helene sends packages of food to the shop during the post-war rationing, they sometimes send her Christmas presents, and she often berates them for failing to find the books she wants in a timely fashion. The letters are bookish, warm, and lovely, Helene's entertainingly blunt as she tries to force Frank out of his stubborn polite Englishness. Ultimately, the story these letters tell is a mild, everyday sort of tragedy, of the sort one's childish instinctive sense of fairness gets woken up for. Despite that, it's still an enormously comforting book, one that makes you wistful for something you never experienced. It's so perfect it's hard to remember it's not fiction.

Another book to count for the Bibliophilic Books Challenge, as well, which I didn't think of until just now. I seem to be reading them all at once (I read Parnassus on Wheels not realizing that counted, too).

I hereby count 84, Charing Cross Road among the books you must read. I intend to start foisting it upon unsuspecting friends as soon as possible.

Parnassus on Wheels

Parnassus on Wheels is really one of those perfect little books that you never expected to read. I got it last Christmas, and have been enjoying the look of it on my shelf, where it has sat since, unread. It's a lovely little 1955 hardcover, illustrated by Douglas Gorsline, and smelling pleasantly of Old Book. The story, by Christopher Morley, was first published in 1917, and is pretty much perfect.

Parnassus is Roger Mifflin's travelling bookshop, pulled by Peg the horse, with Bock the dog along for the ride. Mifflin, often called the Professor, is a funny, wise little man who travels through New England preaching a love of books and selling them. The story is narrated by Helen McGill, a middle-aged spinster, who meets the Professor one morning and decides to buy Parnassus and take up the bookselling life herself. Adventures ensue, naturally, of the sort one expects to find by the side of the road, fisticuffs and weather and so on. All of it, meanwhile, backed by a love of books and a need to hit the road once in a while, and see the world from a different angle. This is what Helen McGill does, and it changes her life thoroughly for the better.

This is a short book, only 160 pages, which didn't take me very long to read. This is sort of a perfect length, as it leaves you wanting more, but also knowing that more would make it a less perfect story. It's also a book that plays to almost everything I want out of a story--bookishness, domesticity, adventure, love. Parnassus on Wheels is one of those books which I am profoundly glad to have read.

Also, it occurs to me now that this qualifies for the Bibliophilic Books Challenge, which I signed up for back in December.

Bibliophilia

I've never done a reading challenge, though there are lots to choose from floating around the internet, and sometimes they appeal to me, but there's one I'm actually thinking about doing in 2010. The Bibliophilic Books Challenge involves reading three, six, or twelve books about books and reading, fiction or not, during 2010. I absolutely love reading bookish books, so I imagine it will be entirely possible to complete this challenge. I'll aim for the lowest level, reading only three books, but if I read more so much the better.

The only book I have specifically in mind is Howards End is on the Landing, by Susan Hill. I'm sure everyone's already heard about this book, but if you haven't: it's nonfiction, about the author's decision to spend a year reading only the books already in her house. Otherwise, the field's wide open; I could read any number of things. I wouldn't be surprised if I read a novel about books without even thinking to apply it to the challenge.

Has anyone read any good bookish books they'd like to recommend? I don't have any particular ideas, so I'd better start compiling a list.