Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader
by Anne Fadiman
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Book Summary Information
Author: Anne FadimanEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2000-11-25
ISBN: 0374527229
Number of pages: 162
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Book Reviews of Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader
Book Review: A Common Reader?
Summary: 4 Stars
Although "Ex Libris" is subtitled as the "Confessions of a Common Reader," Anne Fadiman is anything but. If it hadn't been on loan to me, I probably would have recklessly and mercilessly desecrated the margins of this lovely book, while underlining, highlighting, dog-earing, and drooling on every page. In fact, I'm thinking of buying a copy for my private collection so I can do just that. The author is floridly fixated on books, and her fetish extends beyond her library to the bedroom. (She reads in bed. Her husband reads in bed. They read to each other in bed. And then...well, it depends on what they're reading.) But alas, my fervor for this book does not include the author herself. She seems to think that the love of reading and writing is only bestowed on the best of families, like good bones and strong teeth. The more accurate subtitle would be: "Are Bibliophiles Genetically Superior?" I quote: "There must be writers whose parents owned no books, and who were taken under the wing of a neighbor or librarian, but I have never met one." I think she should step out of her rarefied world of Manhattan book publishing and take a look around. I easily googled several of these award-winning unfortunates, some of whom grew up without electricity or running water. For example, the acclaimed Canadian author Roch Carrier, who, in 1999, became the National Librarian of Canada: "It was a heavy oral tradition, we had no books," he said. "So now, as the national librarian, I visit schools and tell students, 'I went from zero books to being in charge of all the country's books. Anything is possible.'" Ms. Fadiman does not seem to know any "common" people, much less common readers. The "high-cotton" careers of her friends, family, co-workers, and classmates are seeded throughout this would-be tome with frightening regularity. How I longed to hear about just one big old good-buddy trucker who took up the pen. Tell me, would he spurn, as Ms. Fadiman's lawyer classmate did, his wife's "silver Tiffany bookmarks because they are a few microns too thick and might leave vestigial stigmata"? With that off my chest, I have to say that although this is clearly a near-pathological case of obsessive-compulsive bibliomania, reading the book creates a charming contagion.
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