Readings Essays and Literary Entertainments

by Dirda, Michael

• ISBN13: 9780393324891
• ISBN10: 0393324893
• Edition: 00
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2003-10-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

Intimate, humorous, and insightful, Readings is a collection of classic essays and reviews by Michael Dirda, book critic of the Washington Post and winner of the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for criticism. From a first reading of Beckett and Faulkner at the feet of an inspirational high-school English teacher to a meeting of the P. G. Wodehouse Society, from an obsession with Nabokov's Lolita to the discovery of the Japanese epic The Tale of Genji , these essays chronicle a lifetime of literary enjoyment.

Author Biography

Michael Dirda is a writer and senior editor for the Washington Post Book World. For three years he was a board member of the National Book Critics Circle. His essays and reviews have appeared in numerous publications. In 1993 Dirda received the Pulitzer Prize for Distinguished Criticism

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
The Crime of His Life	p. 1
The Quest for Scrivener	p. 4
Talismans	p. 9
Maxims, Etc.	p. 14
Heart of the Matter	p. 19
Bookman's Saturday	p. 23
Supplementary Materials	p. 28
Listening to My Father	p. 33
Romantic Scholarship	p. 38
Weekend with Wodehouse	p. 43
An Abecedary	p. 48
Mr. Wright	p. 53
Heian Holiday	p. 58
Childhood's End	p. 63
The One and the Many	p. 68
Commencement Advice	p. 73
Four Novels and a Memoir	p. 78
The October Country	p. 83
Bookish Fantasies	p. 86
Pages on Life's Way	p. 90
A Garland for Max	p. 95
Read at Whim!	p. 100
Comedy Tonight	p. 105
Light of Other Days	p. 112
Data Daze	p. 117
Four-Leaf Clovers	p. 122
Sez Who?	p. 127
Lament for a Maker	p. 132
Clubland	p. 137
The Learning Channels	p. 140
Guy Davenport	p. 145
Eros by Any Other Name	p. 150
Frank Confessions	p. 155
Mememormee	p. 160
Tomes for Tots	p. 164
Three Classics	p. 169
Vacation Reading	p. 173
One More Modest Proposal	p. 177
Shake Scenes	p. 179
After Strange Books	p. 184
Awful Bits	p. 189
Turning 50	p. 193
Blame It on Books	p. 198
On the Road Not Taken	p. 203
Excursion	p. 208
Millennial Readings	p. 213
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