Too often disappointing, sometimes one's reading truly works, in the way it worked in childhood. How often as an adult does one experience that? When I first read Hotel du Lac, at seventeen, one summer. When I read The Small House at Allington, another summer, in Rome. When I read Anthony Powell, tears smarting in my eyes in an Amsterdam hotel breakfast-room as I learned, via a throwaway remark, of poor Stringham's death.
Rereading almost never matches up. Or else one identifies with new things. In Great Expectations I am cold now to the story of Pip's love for Estella. But I break down when Pip tells Magwitch, at the last, that his lost child lives and is now a lady. Or when old Pip returns to the forge to find Jo and Biddy and their own little son - and Pip sees himself: 'sitting on my own little stool looking at the fire, was - I again!'
Guilty reading can be compulsive too. I'm halfway through May at 10, Anthony Seldon's almost day-by-day account of the Theresa May premiership. It's a horror story. I wince on every page. Why would anyone with so few of the required skills put herself through the hell of being Prime Minister? It's the human details that shine through: a shattered Mrs May falling asleep during a meeting; May's too rare moments of largesse - wine and crisps from Waitrose; her unlucky encounter with a rowdy stag-party of Englishmen at a tourist spot in Estonia. Her security team feared the worst, but the revellers were delighted to meet her, and all wanted selfies.
Rereading almost never matches up. Or else one identifies with new things. In Great Expectations I am cold now to the story of Pip's love for Estella. But I break down when Pip tells Magwitch, at the last, that his lost child lives and is now a lady. Or when old Pip returns to the forge to find Jo and Biddy and their own little son - and Pip sees himself: 'sitting on my own little stool looking at the fire, was - I again!'
Guilty reading can be compulsive too. I'm halfway through May at 10, Anthony Seldon's almost day-by-day account of the Theresa May premiership. It's a horror story. I wince on every page. Why would anyone with so few of the required skills put herself through the hell of being Prime Minister? It's the human details that shine through: a shattered Mrs May falling asleep during a meeting; May's too rare moments of largesse - wine and crisps from Waitrose; her unlucky encounter with a rowdy stag-party of Englishmen at a tourist spot in Estonia. Her security team feared the worst, but the revellers were delighted to meet her, and all wanted selfies.
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