Tony Cooper wrote:
> On Sun, 20 Aug 2006 14:10:26 -0400, Bob LeChevalier
> <lojbab@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
>>> We were talking informally in class not long ago, 17 college
>>> sophomores and I, and on a whim I asked who some of their favorite
>>> writers are. The question hung in uneasy silence. At length, a
>>> voice in the rear hesitantly volunteered the name of . . . Dan
>>> Brown.
>>>
>>> No other names were offered.
>>>
>>> The author of "The DaVinci Code" was not just the best writer they
>>> could think of; he was the only writer they could think of.
>>
>> which may mean some or all of the following, in combination
>> a) they've been studying their textbooks so much that haven't had
>> time for free reading
>> b) they don't bother to remember the authors' names because it is
>> useless information to them
>> c) the books that they read are chosen for subject matter, and not
>> because they like the writer (whose name, per b, they may not have
>> noticed)
>> d) they are considering their audience, and may have favorites, but
>> none that they are willing to admit to an professor.
>
> I'm far past my college days, I read an average of over two books
> (fiction) a week, and I couldn't come up with the names of two of
> the
> authors of the books I've read in the last months.
>
When you say "over two books", do you mean what I mean when I say
"more than"?
> I keep a slip of paper in my car's glove compartment where I keep my
> library card, and I sometimes jot down the name of the author of a
> book I've liked. I usually forget to do so, though, and I usually
> forget to take the slip of paper into the library.
>
> When I browse in the library I read the dust jackets and pick out
> books that seem like they might interest me. Sometimes I'll choose
> a
> book because I notice that it's by the same author of a book I've
> read, but I only know this because the book I've read is right there
> on the shelf.
>
> I could come up Dan Brown's name because I've read TDC, but the only
> reason I remember Brown's name is because the book is mentioned so
> damned often in so many places.
>
> I just finished a book that was OK, but not great, but OK enough
> that
> I would take out another book by the same author. I finished it
> yesterday. I have no idea of the name of the author.
My mother was voracious and omniverous as a reader, sometimes reading
ten or a dozen in a week. During WWII when gasoline was _are ay are
ee_ and public libraries far, she'd pay the nickle-a-day-each to the
slow-revolving rental library in the corner "drugstore". She couldn't
remember titles or authors very well, and took to putting a tick mark
by a selected page number (that she _could_ remember) after a couple
experiences reading a third or half a book she'd already done.
--
Frank ess
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