Friday, October 9, 2020

Unfinished Reading

 

Books you don't finish reading

are like mountains you don't

finish climbing or comparisons

like this that don't seem quite right.


They are like acquaintances who

don't become friends. (This seems

better.) You have been told or

think you see what's up ahead,

but a weariness sets in. Let


the book be great for others,

you think.  Just leave me out of it. 

I've resigned from the reading of

The Fairie Queen, Clarissa, The

Castle of Crossed Destinies, 

The Charterhouse at Parma, 

countless portly mystery novels.

I pretended to finish Paradise

Lost but, as with the film,

The Titanic, I had guessed the ending.


I forced myself to climb Mann's

Magic Mountain. It took

decades, and it wasn't worth it.


When Sam Johnson (who

said of Paradise Lost, "No one

wished it longer") got tired

of a book, he threw it across

the room. Bolder than I,

he didn't resign from reading.

He fired the book.



hans ostrom 2017

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