Reading 2010

In 2010 I read 94 books. That’s about an average number; I’m more of a reader than your common or garden American. And I didn’t use an electronic reader; I did it the old-fashioned way, because I like turning the pages of a book, and no one’s solved that problem of being able to see anything on a screen when you’re in the sun.

Thirty-one of the books came from the library; the rest I own (or, at least, I did at the time of reading). Only 20 were fiction; I’m just not huge on made-up stuff. Of those, 17 were mysteries, mostly police procedurals. I also re-read The Hobbit, and finally got around to the Just So Stories and Schindler’s List.

Well, there was also Purgatorio, translated by Jean Hollander and Robert Hollander. I’m not sure whether that counts as fiction or career advice. Mmm, probably not the latter; that would be Inferno.

Most of the non-fiction is history—history and biography. One of the memorable ones was Marion Meade’s Dorothy Parker: What Fresh Hell Is This? Not only is the subject fascinating, but Meade did her justice with her own writing. At the opposite end was Anaïs: The Erotic Life of Anaïs Nin, by Noel Riley Fitch. Fitch is more interested in her extremely tiresome device of writing in the present tense than she is in a full bio of her subject.

The book that infuriated me the most was A.J.P. Taylor’s The Origins of the Second World War, in which he proved to be a pompous apologist for Hitler. Apparently Der Fuehrer didn’t really want to go to war, but was forced into it by the mistakes of other countries’ leaders. Hard to fathom what planet Taylor was living on throughout the 20th century.

And one of the real treats was The Black-Out Book. This is a collection of games, quizzes, brain-teasers and puzzles compiled to occupy British families during WWII, when there was a shortage of toys and an abundance of nights indoors waiting for German bombers. It’s remarkably stimulating 70 years on, although kids with a 140-character attention span probably wouldn’t find it fun, as none of the activities involves a lighted screen or batteries.

I should have got this post up a couple of weeks ago, but kept putting it off. So I’m starting out the New Year by reading Procrastination: Why You Do It, What to Do About It NOW.