The high point of the evening for me came at the end of the (rather weak) question and answer period, when someone asked (in reference to the Richard Ford-spitting-on-Whitehead incident I wrote about in this week’s Constant Reader) whether Whitehead had, in his thirties, reconsidered his distaste for Richard Ford’s writing, particularly the Frank Bascombe novels. After a delicious pause, Whitehead said that there are lots of people who enjoy reading novels about “male menopause,” and that there’s nothing wrong with that, and that it’s great that they never have to wait very long for “The next Frank Bascombe sequel to be churned out.” The laughter was both strong and uncomfortable for the Seattle Arts and Lectures crowd, which does quite a bit of worship at the altar of literary celebrity.
"A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight." - Robertson Davies
"A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little good." - Dr. Samuel Johnson
"The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries." - Rene Descartes
"Reading made Don Quixote a gentleman, but believing what he read made him mad." - George Bernard Shaw
"The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go." - Dr. Seuss
"You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them." - Ray Bradbury
I failed to attend, but The Stranger's Paul Constant was on the scene:
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