Theresa, I used to go into Cameron’s all the time. Several times I bought a Life or a Look magazine from the same month/year of someone’s birthday and gave it as a gift. Who wouldn’t want to know what the world was like when they were born?
I recognized all the authors you mentioned and have some of their books and short stories. Loved your defense of F. Scott Fitzgerald -- you can’t judge someone born in 1896 by today’s standards. So what if he used Zelda as his muse? Fiction writers write about people. How can a writer not be influenced by the people he interacts with?
Your reference to Sherwood Anderson reminded me of his book “Winesburg, Ohio.” I enjoyed that book in college, yet I can’t remember the last time I opened it.
After listening to you, I found it on my book shelf. The first story, “The Book of the Grotesque” is about an old writer dying:
“The idea got into his mind that he would some time die unexpectedly and always when he got into bed he thought of that. It did not alarm him. The effect in fact was quite a special thing and not easily explained. It made him more alive, there in bed, than at any other time. Perfectly still he lay and his body was old and not of much use any more, but something inside him was altogether young. He was like a pregnant woman, only that thing inside him was not a baby but a youth. …”
And to think — the first time I read those words I was young.
Theresa, I used to go into Cameron’s all the time. Several times I bought a Life or a Look magazine from the same month/year of someone’s birthday and gave it as a gift. Who wouldn’t want to know what the world was like when they were born?
I recognized all the authors you mentioned and have some of their books and short stories. Loved your defense of F. Scott Fitzgerald -- you can’t judge someone born in 1896 by today’s standards. So what if he used Zelda as his muse? Fiction writers write about people. How can a writer not be influenced by the people he interacts with?
Your reference to Sherwood Anderson reminded me of his book “Winesburg, Ohio.” I enjoyed that book in college, yet I can’t remember the last time I opened it.
After listening to you, I found it on my book shelf. The first story, “The Book of the Grotesque” is about an old writer dying:
“The idea got into his mind that he would some time die unexpectedly and always when he got into bed he thought of that. It did not alarm him. The effect in fact was quite a special thing and not easily explained. It made him more alive, there in bed, than at any other time. Perfectly still he lay and his body was old and not of much use any more, but something inside him was altogether young. He was like a pregnant woman, only that thing inside him was not a baby but a youth. …”
And to think — the first time I read those words I was young.
Great comment! “The Book of the Grotesque.” Now, I’m going to have to buy that. As in right now. Thank you for the tip! And for your perspective!