Books books books

the view from here

Books are my security blanket. When I found myself at the doctor's office today without my own reading material, I nearly panicked. Sticky back issues of Arthritis Digest did not appeal. I almost never travel without at least a magazine shoved in my bag; the New Yorker is nice and slim for this purpose, but I've been known to heft a big fat September Vogue into Boston to occupy my two hour round trip.

I shudder to estimate that about $2000 of the cost of our most recent move can be attributed to books, 30 or so boxes of them. Silly, maybe, in the age of Kindle and the Internet, when everything's available at the touch of a button, to continue to shlep around heavy piles of actual books, but there's something reassuring about the tactile sensation of turning pages, the thick glossy stock of art books, a well-thumbed paperback with page corners turned down to mark a particularly wonderful passage. And I can't see reading to my kids in bed with a Kindle. They need to scan their shelves, book spines committed to memory before they could read, to select exactly what they are in the mood for on any given night. I suppose that just as printed newpapers seem to be headed for extinction, and the iPod has become an accepted substitute for a shelf full of albums, the electronic book may replace the library. But I hope not.

above three photos from Desire to Inspire

currently on my nightstand

Fashion Gossip

I was surprised to discover in a Metro article that one of my favorite street-style bloggers, Garance Doré, and Scott Schuman of Sartorialist fame, are "a couple". They have both mentioned the other favorably on their respective blogs and participated in blog forums together, but the romance seems to be a new development. Or at least newly public...

The article in the Metro mentions that they'll be collaborating on some fashion shoots together, with Scott as photographer and Garance as stylist.

I love Maira Kalman

Maira Kalman's beautifully illustrated musings on Abe Lincoln and other tangents for the NY Times are worth a look.

Coco's blog

My daughter just turned 7, and I promised to let her set up her own blog, so here it is!

Updike at Rest

It was with the hubris of a 20-year old that I sent my first-ever attempt at writing a short story to a master of the form, requesting a critique. Imagine my shock when I received, within a week, a most gracious personal note from John Updike. Although he declined my offer of dinner, he encouraged my writing, praised the character development in the short story, and predicted that if I kept up writing I'd "go far." While his prediction was sadly off the mark, I have never forgotten Updike's kindness in taking the time to read an unsolicited manuscript from a college student with no connections, while at the same time keeping up an amazingly prolific output of his own poetry, criticism, New Yorker articles and novels.

Updike wrote about the ennui and sexual undercurrents of middle-class suburban life with the most gorgeous prose imaginable. His stated aim to "give the mundane its beautiful due" was fully realized in his masterful Rabbit series of novels. If you haven't read them, proceed directly to your local library and check out Rabbit, Run today.

He experimented with a variety of styles and forms throughout his long career, including a retelling of Shakespeare in Gertrude and Claudius, sci-fi in Toward the End of Time and art criticism in Just Looking. His early short story, A&P, is absolute perfection. The Witches of Eastwick probably brought Updike the most fame, especially after it was made into a movie starring Jack Nicholson, Cher, Susan Sarandon, and the young unknown, Michelle Pfieffer. Witches was not his strongest work, but I contend that even "bad" Updike is better than most writers at their best, so beautifully crafted are his sentences.

My first encounter with his work was in high school, when my family moved to Ipswich, Massachusetts, where Updike and his first wife had lived when his thinly disguised account of his own, and several other couples, adulterous affairs rocked the small town and landed him the cover of Newsweek. By the time I arrived, Updike had already been run out of town (or so the rumor went), a direct result of the scandal that followed the publication of Couples. He didn't court celebrity, and it did nothing to diminish his prodigious output. Updike settled nearby in Beverly Farms with his second wife, and remained there until his death this morning from lung cancer. Rest in peace, Mr. Updike.