Life in the Big City

Reading

Yep, that's been me, over there on the couch or up late at night in the bed, reading words on PAPER instead of on this screen. I finally gave up on ever trying to finish The God of Small Things, which was coming ever closer to its heavily foreshadowed depressing conclusion, and even though the writing was very rich and intriguing, I just looked at that book with sheer dread. It sat by my bed like that, gathering dust, for months. It's still sitting there, actually, but I've moved on to other things. Briefly, I moved on to 20 Years in a Desert Jail, which I thought would be gripping and moving and teach me something about life, but I got quickly bored with that one as well. For one thing, I had been under the mistaken impression that she was Iranian, not Moroccan, and it was Iran that I had really been wanting to read about. And then there was all this stuff about growing up in a palace and being a sort of adopted princess and loving her beautiful mother from afar and the stables and the governesses that just sort of turned me off. I feel bad, but there it is. Never made it to the jail.

So...

I've been plowing through my old New Yorkers. Yeah, go ahead, roll your eyes, I read the New Yorker and listen to NPR and drink red wine and enjoy a little Mozart now and then. So fucking what. Anyway, I read a fascinating article on Koffi Anan and the role of the UN, another fascinating article on the director of PETA, several stunningly excellent Talk of the Town pieces by Hendrik Hertzberg and David Remnick who just TOTALLY kicks Tina Brown's ass, I don't care if she does write for Salon, I'll forever think of her as the whore who tried to Hollywood-ize my magazine, and I'm glad she's gone. There was a scathingly funny review of The Matrix:Reloaded which said in such better style why it didn't even hold a candle to the first movie. And a lovely article by Roger Angell, baseball writer, Red Sox fan, humorist, stepson of E.B. White about the car trips of his youth. Delightful. And now I can say with some relief I am completely caught up on my New Yorkers, so BRING IT ON Mr. Mailman.

In the books department, I've started reading The Professor and the Madman, which is the bizarre and true story of the making of the Oxford English Dictionary. No, seriously, it's not boring. Well, not to me. So a book I may actually finish as I make my way through the pile. Next after this is The Corrections, which I've been waiting to read with such anticipation I'm actually concerned that it won't live up.

What are you reading?