Thursday, May 29, 2008
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Shaken to the core.
I'm stuck. I just finished How to Talk About Books You Haven't Read (Pierre Bayard). And I am disturbed. All of my reading life I've felt my mortality keenly in the knowledge that there are billions of books I will never read. Have you ever done the math? It's terrifying.
It also puts me in mind of a really unsettling travel moment. On impulse I popped into a book store in a small town in France and without a thought wandered over to a shelf...as you do. And then it hit me. I can't read. All of these lovely books undiscovered. I can't read. So on top of the old fear of all of the books in English I will never read...now this. And then that math.
And then the other horrible suspicion I've been contending with of late...translations. Who are these people? Do they wield their power for good or evil? Is a complete reinterpretation really considered the same book? Remember that episode of Northern Exposure when the elfin shop owner decides she can't die until she is able to read Dante in Italian? Ugh. I'm going to bed.
It also puts me in mind of a really unsettling travel moment. On impulse I popped into a book store in a small town in France and without a thought wandered over to a shelf...as you do. And then it hit me. I can't read. All of these lovely books undiscovered. I can't read. So on top of the old fear of all of the books in English I will never read...now this. And then that math.
And then the other horrible suspicion I've been contending with of late...translations. Who are these people? Do they wield their power for good or evil? Is a complete reinterpretation really considered the same book? Remember that episode of Northern Exposure when the elfin shop owner decides she can't die until she is able to read Dante in Italian? Ugh. I'm going to bed.
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