Book Smarts

I am not, in the traditional sense, well read.

This is surprising, considering that I have a decent educational background (during which "required reading" provides even the most non-bookish people a few notches for their literary belts).

This is surprising because I am an insatiable reader, a lover of pamphlets and novellas and triologies and labels.

This is surprising because I breathe to write, and who better to learn from but the recognized Masters?

I see lists like the one compiled by those folks at Time Magazine* and I feel a combination of excitement (so many books!) and trepidation. I scan the list for familiar titles, and though I recognize most of them, I've usually read less than half. And for some reason, this makes me feel inadequate.

You see, I'm intimidated by those books. My experiences, with many of them, the classics, have not always been good. Written post-mortems usually followed their consumption; long essays in response to a profound question, culminating in a letter grade, not only assigned for the interpretation and the narrative, but also for the penmanship.

And I'm intimidated by the lovers of those books. Because somehow, there's a part of me that feels like I don't measure up. That I'm being judged. That I wasn't smart enough to have caught on to the global, human messages that those "chosen" books convey. I did not like "Catcher in the Rye" though I believe that I "got" it. It just didn't resonate with me. I felt, however, that Sinclair's "The Jungle" was profound, and I have never seen that book on any lists. The same with "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time." I read that one last year and it was awe-inspiring and genuine and amazing. Let me leaf through my copy of Time; nope, no sign of Mark Haddon or his book. And for that matter, where's Shel Silverstein? Or Mo Willems? Or Julia Alvarez? Or Terry McMillan?

I could not choose a favorite book or a favorite writer (maybe, if arm was twisted, I would mention "To Kill a Mockingbird"). In my crude opinion, however, Stephen King is a master of detail; he creates images that engage all of my senses--(I could see the shiny body of Christine, smell her interior, feel the cracks on her windshield). Jacqueline Susann is a master of suspenseful drama (I was dying, just dying, to know whether or not Neely O'Hara was going to get her comeuppance). And Danielle Steel (gasp--I can barely believe that I'm writing this) is a master at telling a story (though they aren't the stories that I usually want to hear)--no one else uses a run-on sentence to create a sense of breathless continuity, a repititive, "drum it into the ground" sense of simple emotion.

I believe that most authors convey something of value. Writers engage people. They impact lives in both subtle and magnificent ways. The question is: who decides which works have value or how much value or when the value gets to be acknowledged? "Cane River" by Lalita Tademy brilliantly portrayed life in the South for Les Gens de Couleurs during the time prior to and during emancipation. Who is anyone to say that that book should not be considered a classic? Does it need to percolate for a few years? Does it need to be ripped into grounds, analyzed and expanded, measured and poured? Does the honor of being an "Oprah pick" knock it out of contention?

Or Amy Tan's ability to tell stories about her mother? One of my most favorite things in "The Opposite of Fate" was where Tan wrote about how there is now a CliffsNotes booklet for "The Joy Luck Club." She gets a real kick out of this. She says that she gets calls from graduate students who have contrived theories and theses about her work--recurring themes, hidden agendas, symbolism--and that she has to tell them, Nope, sorry, that wasn't what I meant . . . I was just telling a story.

I think that literary people are just as insecure as me. They hide behind their classic picks and their ability to "discuss them" and I hide behind my defiance and refusal to particpate.

Because I might say something wrong.

Can't the love of reading bring us together? Build a bridge, for God's sake?

You like what you like. It's as simple as that.

If, being well read, means that you have consumed several of Shakespeare's plays, works by Jack Kerouac, Gertrude Stein, a few of the Brontes, and "Walden," then I suppose I could say that I have experience; I didn't enjoy them, but I have the experience. If it means that you've read scholarly articles that begin with abstracts and have key words and elaborate graphs and flow-charts, then I may fit the criteria.

But if it means someone who values words, from the ones on the back of a bag of bread to the ones in the pages of "Of Mice and Men" and all of the delectable ones in between , then I am "well read" in the grandest interpretation of the definition.

I think I'm going with theory number three. That's good enough for me.

* I realize that the Time List was for 100 All Time NOVELS; I know that Shel Silverstein and Mo Willems couldn't be contenders anyway. I just wanted to throw them in because they inspire me.