Michael Dirda (The Post)

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Dirda on Books
Hosted by Michael Dirda
Washington Post Book World Senior Editor
Friday, April 25, 2002; 2 p.m. EDT

Washington Post Book World Senior Editor Michael Dirda takes your questions and comments concerning literature, books and the joys of reading.

Each week Dirda's name appears -- in unmistakably big letters -- on page 15 of The Post's Book World section. If he's not reviewing a hefty literary biography or an ambitious new novel, he's likely to be turning out one of his idiosyncratic essays or describing his travels to, say, a P.G. Wodehouse Convention. Although he earned a Ph.D. in comparative literature from Cornell, Dirda has somehow managed to retain a myopic 12-year-old's passion for reading. He particularly enjoys comic novels, intellectual history, locked-room mysteries, innovative fiction of all sorts -- just the sort of range you'd expect from a Pulitzer Prize winner in criticism (1993).

These days, Dirda says he still spends inordinate amounts of time mourning his lost youth, listening to music (Glenn Gould, Ella Fitzgerald, Diana Krall, The Tallis Scholars), and daydreaming ("my only real hobby"). He claims that the happiest hours of his week are spent sitting in front of a computer, working. In the fall of 2000 Indiana University Press published "Readings: Essays and Literary Entertainments," a selection from Dirda's Book World columns. He hopes to bring out a companion volume soon.

Dirda joined The Post in 1978, having grown up in the working-class steel town of Lorain, Ohio and graduated with highest honors in English from Oberlin College. His favorite writers are Stendhal, Chekhov, Jane Austen, Evelyn Waugh, T.S. Eliot, Nabokov, John Dickson Carr, Joseph Mitchell and Jack Vance. He thinks the greatest novel of all time is either Murasaki Shikubu's "The Tale of Genji" or Proust's "A la recherche du temps perdu." In a just world he would own Watteau's painting "The Embarkation for Cythera." He'd also like to spend six months in Florida writing a book that would become a runaway best seller, a critical success, and the hottest cinematic property of the year. A guy can daydream, right?

The transcript follows.

Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.

Silver Spring, Md.: Missed the chat last week. Wanted to put a pitch in to my 7th grade teacher at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel School in Cleveland, Ohio who not only taught us how to write a properly constructed essay, but also introduced us to "The Odyssey." It was a version written at a 7th grade level, but it whet our appetite for the real thing.

He also encouraged lots of independent reading and recommended that those of us who enjoyed the Odyssey would also like Thor Heyerdahl's Kon Tiki. What a great adventure read!

By the way... on the speculative fiction front, how do you feel about Harlan Ellison? He's one of my favorites.

Michael Dirda: WElcome to Dirda on Books! The fingers are a little tired today, as I"ve just come off this month's Book Club discussion (from 12-1) of The Oxford Book of Aphorisms, compiled by John Gross. Recommended to all regulars of this page.
In the meantime, for the next hour we'll talk books, reading, publishing, reviewing, what have you. As many of you know already, I'll be taking a break from my writing for Book world after this Sunday, but I"ll still be doing this liveonline show. It's possible, however, that my time and may change, as I adjust my schedule over the next week or two. So stay alert! I'm sorry to allow the vicissitudes of life to interefere with the regularity of this discussion. But such things happen.
Anyway, on with this week's show.


I think everyone read, or heard, The Odyssey first in some kind of kiddie version. In my case, I can recall my father telling me the story of Ulysses--as he called him--and the Sirens, Circe, Cyclops. Such adventures were as good as ghost stories.
As for Harlan Ellison--in his younger days he was a whirligig of narrative energy, sparks and fire from every page. But the man himself can be paranoid and boorish to any who dare to cross him. So my feelings are mixed. Who doesn't love Repent Harlequin said the Tick-Tock Man and at least a half dozen others. And Dangerous Visions was a landmark in sf publishing.

Alexandria, Va.: Barnes and Noble in Springfield was offering for sale a remaindered copy of the anti-Semitic forgery "Protocols of the Elders of Zion." The cover of the book stated that it should be filed under "History."

I complained to the manager, who compassionately told me that she herself was Jewish and offended by the book. She stated that as manager she had no control over what remaindered books her employer sent her and that all that she could do was place the book in the fiction section where it belonged.

How might you have handled the situation?

I was satisfied under the circumstances with the manager's response, but I would have liked it even better if she could have sent the book back to headquarters with a note explaining that it was defective due to being mislabeled.

Do you think that bookstores ought to have policies against mislabeled hate literature? The book was in no way written by "Elders of Zion" but rather was written by a member of the Russian secret police and plagiarized from an earlier French anti-Masonic tract.

Michael Dirda: Interesting issue. Certainly the book was mislabled and your suggested course might be the right one. But a number of books trod the genre borders--Was My Secret Garden by Nancy Friday sociology or fiction? I at least hope that the copy of Elders you found carried a preface by a reputable scholar, explaining the book as a work of historica propaganda.

Somewhere, USA: Michael, you've mentioned wanting to try your hand at fiction. Any plans to write a novel or a book of short stories?

Michael Dirda: Have I said this? I might try it. I don't know, though. I've worked hard to arrange time away from my regular journalism to work on book projects, but right now I feel so weary of everything that all I want to do is read for pleasure, listen to music and watch videos. Maybe I've waited too long: timing, they say, is everything and I never seem to do things at the right moment. Still, we'll see in a couple of months. All a matter of will, I guess. Though will is, as Augustine knew, a mysterious matter.

Princeton, N.J.: I've been thinking about last week's discussion about how schools interfere with children's reading pleasure. I've lived overseas since 1982, moving to a different country every two or three years. I've noticed that schools which use the U.S. curriculum ALWAYS assign the same tired old books -- "Stone Soup," "Johnny Tremaine," "Island of the Blue Dolphin," etc. Both of my kids have read "James and the Giant Peach" three times; they have had to re-read "Charlotte's Web" and "The Bridge at Terabitha," among others. Local Princeton public schools assign these books, too. Teachers the world over must be pulling these selections off some educational Web site. In contrast, I once homeschooled a 6th grader using Calvert School -- she read "Around the World in 80 Days," "Lorna Doone," "Kidnapped" and some wonderful out-of print books (for example, "Theras and his Town" by Caroline Dale Snedeker). She loved the plots of these old classics and the challenge they posed to her reading ability.

Michael Dirda: Yes, it must be tiresome for everyone to keep going back to the same works. I suppose the rationale is that the books you mention are particularly teachable, or carry valuable moral lessons. A lot of the fuss over the canon during the past 20 years addresses just this issue: What should kids read? What should they know? The only good answer to both these questions is Everything. But time and life is limited. Still, it does seem that every 8th or 9th grader in America now reads Scott Card's Ender's Game.

Somewhere, USA: Have you read Richard Russo's Pulitzer Prize winning Empire Falls?

Might I suggest that any Russo fans out there also grab a copy of his book "Straight Man." Its a satire of a College Professor that I found asbolutely hilarious.

Michael Dirda: Haven't read Empire Falls, but did buy a copy of Straight Man, about which I"d heard repeatedly from various sources. I like comic novels set in academe a lot. I guess because I both rejoice in and regret my escape from that life. What did you find so funny in the book?

Takoma Park, Md.: Noticed your answer to the Atwood query during the Book Club. The very witty Atwood is my favorite author.

Robber Bride and Cats Eye are both witty and deep, RB especially.

Surfacing, her first novel, is innovative in form, glorious in language, and wondrously strange.

Handmaid's Tale is best recent book, overtly political and you hve to be able to deal with that to enjoy it.

Blind Assassin and Alias Grace were both second-rate with plot problems and lack-of-interest problems in my view.

Robber Bride and Surfacing are my prime Atwood recommendations. Short stories are also terrific.

washingtonpost.com: Bookclub: "The Oxford Book of Aphorisms" (April 25, 2002)

Michael Dirda: Many thanks. Good to have such an authoritative listing of the Atwood oeuvre.

Baltimore, Md.: Just purchased Anna Karenina and Possession. I realize neither is fluffy, but which is the easier read for the dulled vacationing mind? Thanks!

Michael Dirda: Hard call. I'd probably go with the Tolstoy, as the established classic. Compulsively readable, in its way, but not a laugh a minute.

Fairfax, Va.: Michael, what ever happend to cyberpunk as a genre? Gibson and Sterling have disappeared, Neal Stevenson hasn't had anything out in three years, and nobody in the second tier looks promising. Is it dead, or has it just been absorbed into the SF mainstream?
Thanks!

Michael Dirda: I think cyberpunk as a genre is moribund, if not dead. The writers you mention are now just writing their own books and none wants to be identified as a cyberpunk. Besides these guys are now well on their way to being late middle aged. Hard to be a rocker with gray hair and a belly--though groups do keep touring, to general amazament and embarrassment. A lot of the cyberpunk dash and style has been absorbed by all kinds of writers. Like most schools of art, it was probably a conveneneint fiction more than anything else.

Palookaville: I was just reading the umpteenth pundit talking about whether Bush is pursuing a "rope-a-dope" strategy in the Middle East. According to War and Peace, the Russians used essentially the same strategy to defeat Napoleon, but you don't ever hear anyone referring to the "War and Peace strategy." From this we can conclude that Muhammad Ali was an even greater literary giant than Tolstoy.

Michael Dirda: It's the phrase-making that matters, not the source. And it helps to be a media star.

New York, N.Y.: Who was the name of the writer of the story about aliens coming to Earth to help humans and their book turned out to be a cookbook? I forgot to write down the name of the author. In some way, that reminds me of a Twilight Zone episode about aliens coming to Earth and saying they had respected humans but now were not so convinced. They were given an amount of time to reform. So the world get's together and agrees to a peace protocol across the planet. The aliens come back and say that they had been looking for warriors. That episode sticks in my mind though I saw it as a child. Anyway, I'd like to read that story.

Michael Dirda: Damon Knight "To Serve Man." Can be found in sf anthologies and best of Knight collections.

Washington, D.C.: Looking for suggestions for two types of books:

1. Anything either uplifting or empathetic to one despondent about unrequited love.

2. Any favorite Australian authors or books on Australia.

Many Thanks.

Michael Dirda: Gee. You might try the Olympian view--listen to Wagner's Tristan, read Madame Bovary or Anna Karenina, tune in to your local country-western station: If love isn't unrequited, then it nearly always goes badly and everyone ends up dead.
Australians--Peter Carey, Patrick White, Les Murray, Helen Garner, Clive James. On Australia: Cooper's Creek by Alan Moorehead or the big history by Robert Hughes.

Southern Maryland: Not really a question, just a comment. Back in college in 1980, and full of a teenager's disrespect for authority, I read Catch-22 and loved it instantly. I wound up buying it about six times because the copies I kept pushing onto other friends never came back. Then I went on to Something Happened, and it was like stepping into a cold shower. To the eyes and mind of a college kid, it couldn't have been more opposite of everything Catch-22 was; I slogged through about 100 pages and then quit. Now, newly into my 40s, I picked it up again, and it was as though the scales fell from my eyes. There is so much of the book -- the petty office back-stabbings, the questions of mid-life crisis, the status-craving mentality -- that an 18-year-old couldn’t fathom or fully appreciate. There is still humor there, but while Yossarian's dark humor could still be funny, Slocum's is so very dark that there's nothing to laugh at; it's just harrowing. Granted, a lot of the story is very much a function of time and place (late-60s NYC) so it seems almost primitive in some of its facets, e.g. the way it views women, minorities, philandering, etc. But in some ways it's a much bigger (or at least more ambitious) book than Catch-22 in that, instead of just sketching a whole squadron of misfits it tries to do an MRI and EEG of a single hollow soul. Anyway, if I have to come up with some questions, here's one: Am I alone in thinking that Something Happened is at least the equal of Catch-22, even though it's not nearly as famous? And here's a bigger broader question: Are there other examples you can think of, of a book that can only be appreciated when the reader has reached a certain age or perspective of life?

Michael Dirda: Superb posting. I've never read Something Happened, alas, but I've heard your judgment of the book before--certainly you make it sound like something we should all rush out to read. In short, I expect it IS a denser, more ambitious book, but not as ingratiating a one as Catch 22. As for age: People have long remarked that you can only truly appreciate Henry James in middle age, just as you can only truly love Thomas Wolfe when young. I've actually been thinking a little abou this very question, so I may have further reflections another time.

St. Louis, Mo.: A friend of mine just recommended the mystery writer Jonathan Latimer, who was a contemporary (and supposedly the equal of) Chandler, Hammet, Cain, etc. Have you ever heard of this hardboiled writer?

Michael Dirda: Yes. I think I've read a story or two. Is he the one with the alcoholic detective, who eventually goes on the wagon? Or is that Patrick Quentin? No, wait, I think his detective is Jonathan Stagge--could this be right? Gosh, the answer is I've heard of him, but don't know the books at all. ANyone?

re: Australia: Don't forget The Thornbirds! Tear-jerker, yes, but has a lot about Australia's coming of age between 1900 and 1950.

Michael Dirda: thanks

Washington, D.C.: Michael -- You said in a recent chat that adultery might be considered the prime theme of literature, or something like that. Can you expand on that?

Michael Dirda: Well, love is certainly the main theme of fiction, and as one needs obstacles and such to make a story interesting, adultery suggests itself as the best way to do this. Otherwise our young people would simply fall into each othre's arms and marry. End of story. Probably the places to start on this theme are Denis de Rougemont's Love in the Western World and Tony Tanner's Adultery in the Novel.

Tag from last week: While I may not have enjoyed all of the books various English teachers recommended (Wilson Harris' Carnival Trilogy has to be the book I've disliked the most, ever, and I read it twice to make sure.), I am still glad for the exposure. Otherwise, I might have totally written off Virginia Woolf after To The Lighthouse, were it not for Orlando.

You never know what you may end up liking without exposure to all sorts of books.

Michael Dirda: Yes indeed.

Washington, D.C.: Hello Michael -- Who's going to take your slot (no one can ever take your place!) in the Book World?

Michael Dirda: We'll just run reviews there and possibly an occasional feature. In theory, I'll be back in a few months.

Brownsville, N.Y.: I just discovered cyberpunk and have been eating up the novels of William Gibson and Neal Stephenson. (By the way, I think the Cryptonomicon has to rank with the best popular fiction of the last few decades, funny, exciting, really, really smart) As I'm not really a sci-fi reader, I don't know where to go from here. Are there any other novels about the computer/cyber world that I've been missing?

Thanks.

Michael Dirda: You might try The Gold Bug Variations by RIchard Powers. I presume you know the Gibson/Sterling steam-punk novel, The ARtificial Engine.

Towson, Md.: I came across a Sidney Lanier's version for youngsters of Mallory's Arthur and was charmed when thumbing through. Do you have an opinion?

BTW, I just began Titus Groan. This isn't going to be a fast read, is it?

Michael Dirda: No opinion, and no, it's not a fast read: You have to like the thickened style and the grotesque characters. Many don't.

Woodbridge, Va.: Michael -- I have a suggestion for a topic for discussion. We have never talked about fonts and illustrations in our favorite books.

Fonts maybe doesn't interested everybody, but I can tell you that as an Olderperson who already goes through various contortions while reading -- glasses on, glasses off, book next to nose, book far away -- that I really prefer plain fonts. One example is the font used in the Penguin reprints of Iris Murdoch's novels -- I can't read it, so instead I am looking for old hardcovers by her in used book stores.

And illustrations! As a Notyetgrownupoldlady, I love them. I can't figure out why they don't illustrate all novels. They are able to make such beautiful books nowadays. When I buy a novel set someplace that I have never been -- India, say, or Egypt -- I often buy one of those Knopf or Eyewitness travel guides to the country so I can see pictures. I recently read a Jane Langton mystery set in Venice -- she has drawings in all her mysteries, and they helped me visualize the art & architecture she was talking about. I absolutely think novels should be illustrated.

Have you noticed that book reviews rarely comment on illustrations? Do the copies you get not include them?

I would enjoy hearing what illustrated books you and your readers have enjoyed.

Michael Dirda: This is a good questoin. Maybe we can talk more fully about illustrations and book design next week. OK?
Years ago John Gardner used to insist on, and perhaps commission, illustrators to do pictures for his books. But except for experiments or children's books, one seldom finds art in books--I suppose it's 1) an extra expense, and 2) a distraction to people who'd rather imagine the characters and scenes with "their mind's eye."
But let's talk more about such matters next time.

Farragut Square, Washington, D.C.: In your opinion, who's the best mystery writer still writing today? Who's tops in the past? I'd love to find another novelist who can keep me up all night turning pages (last good mystery I read was Caleb Carr's 'The Alienist').

Michael Dirda: Ruth Rendell--though some of her books are as much psychological suspense as mystery. But there are a lot of them. Besides her, I'd pick Dick Francis--impossible to put down--and Donald Westlake--funny or black humored under his own name, hard boiled as Richard Stark.

Washington, D.C.: I tried this question last week -- I'll try again today. I enjoyed your review of The Eyre Affair. I asked you about this book (one of those "any buzz on this title" questions) in a chat many months ago, when the book had appeared only in the UK. At the time, you had not heard of it. My question: aside from amazon's UK subsidiary, do you know of any good sources of literary developments in the UK? For example, I just about missed the fact that William Boyd (Ice Cream War) has a new novel out, published this week, in fact, but just in the UK (so far). I happened upon this news on amazon UK. Boyd's a favorite of mine and I would have hated to miss out on this news altogether. Thanks!

Michael Dirda: Most writers of Boyd's stature will eventually be published here. Do you know Arts and Letters Daily? A web site that trolls the world for literary news. I'd check there. No doubt those more familiar with cyberspace can suggest other venues.

Aussie Books: Thomas Keneally, author of Schindler's List, is a famous Australian author. His book The Playmaker takes place in colonial times and was a fantastic read.
I also just finished The True History of the Kelly Gang (can't remember the author) and enjoyed it well.
In a used book bin I picked up Leaning Toward Infinity by Sue Woolf, a novel about a modern-day mathematician and her findings. Obscure but enjoyable.

Michael Dirda: Kelly Gang is by Peter Carey. Thanks.

A bit of humor: Here's a funny little anecdote you may enjoy as you recover from your hernia and seek your way post-Book World.

I returned home from a recent visit from the library with a copy of Sue Grafton's most recent mystery in hand. My daughter and son (12 & 10) were hanging out in the living room when I arrived and asked what I'd gotten out.

I told them, "P is for Peril." There was a moment of silence, then gales of laughter from both of them. I was perplexed. "What's so funny? It's just a mystery."

"Pee is for Peril," my daughter gasped between laughs. "What a name for a book!"

I wonder if Sue Grafton has to put up with this type of thing?!

Michael Dirda: ONly if her readers are 10 and 12. Cute story.

Washington, D.C.: Just finished Michael Frayn's Headlong and really liked it. Have you read Spies? Was curious what you thought.

Michael Dirda: Reviewed Headlong with mix opinion--didn't seem funny enough, didn't seem plausible enough. But I was in a minority on this one. No one seems to much like Spies, though I haven't read it.

Chantilly, Va.: Going on a trip in a week to Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego and I'm looking for good books on the area. Preferably with a nonfiction component rather than just fiction. I've read Chatwin's In Patagonia already.
Thanks.

Michael Dirda: Paul Theroux's railroad book on South America: The great Pataonian Express. W.H. Hudson's books. Doesn't Chatwin discuss his predecessors?

Alexandria,Va.: Just finishing The Priest by Thomas Disch based on a recommendation in Book World a few weeks back. Talk about scabrous -- I'm really enjoying it although it's got something to offend nearly everyone. Can you recommend other books he's written?

Michael Dirda: Tom's written a lot. IN that loose series you might try The M.D. next. He's also a fine poet, author of The Brave Little Toaster, a devastating critic (The Castle of INdolence), and a master of sardonic, literate science fiction: 334 and Camp Concentration, or any collection of stories.

Terrytown: This has nothing to do with books, but the mention of the aliens coming to earth with the cookbook reminds me of a very entertaining simpsons episode (at least entertaining to me). The one where lisa and the alien take turns blowing dust off the cover of a book so that its meaning goes back and forth about five times, as to whether it is about cooking humans, or cooking FOR humans.

haha exxxxcellent!

Michael Dirda: Yes, it's a homage to the Knight story, which became a famous episode of Twilight Zone.

Chantilly, Va.: I'm reading Peggy Noonan's "When Character Was King" and finding it lacking in comparison to Edmund Morris' Reagan biography, "Dutch." Perhaps the comparison is unfair, but both are biographies about Reagan, so perhaps not.

Do you have any preference among the many books on Reagan?

Michael Dirda: None. My take on Reagan is basically that of John Sladek and J.G. Ballard. Scabrous, as someone said earlier.

re: Protocols: Presumably you upbraided the manager for displaying "Mein Kampf" in history as well. Obviously, "Protocols" is tripe, and I can't imagine that a version still in existence wouldn't have some scholar explaining that in a foreword. Still, which is the sign of a more robust society: to offer for sale some hateful garbage, fairly confident that it will wind up in the hands of a thoughtful and curious self-learner, or to seek to remove entirely from the written realm that which is offensive, thereby forcing a literate society to rely on the opinions/theories/convictions/biases of third parties?

If I'd seen it, I would have bought it, simply to see the depths of vileness humanity can sink, and to get a first-hand feel for the context of pre-Revolutionary Russian society. It's not like anybody evil is making money off it (unless you count B&N). "Defective because it's mislabelled..."...please...

Michael Dirda: thanks.

Swim-two-birds: Count me among the fans of Something Happened. I agree with the previous poster that it is at least the equal of Catch-22. And I read it in my early 20s! After that, unfortunately, Heller went completely south. Good As Gold is pretty lousy, for example.

(I thought the Gibson/Sterling book was called The Diference Engine.)

Michael Dirda: Oh, you'r right on Gibson/Sterling. I wrote too fast. thanks too on Heller

Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C.: Mr. Dirda,

I am trying to get a good grip of what's happening in literature around the world, and would like to hear any suggestions to contemporary North European, esp. Scandinavian authors, who have been tranlated into English.

Michael Dirda: Find a copy of Martin Seymour-Smith's monumental New Guide to MOdern World Literature. There's a fine chapter on scandinavian lit in it.

Reston, Va.: No question this week. I just wanted to thank you for taking the time to speak at the Chantilly library on a rainy Sunday afternoon, when you probably would have been happier curled up with a good book. You seemed to be enjoying yourself, though, as did the audience. As I rose to put on my jacket to leave, I overheard a woman ask her husband if he thought he was going to be all right without having your column to read every week. I smiled to myself, thinking that I wasn’t the only one addicted to your writing.

Michael Dirda: thank you for the kind words.

Washington, D.C.: Have you read or are you going to review "THE ORNAMENT OF THE WORLD, How Muslims, Jews and Christians Created a Culture of Tolerance in Mediaval Spain," by Maria Rosa Menocal, R. Selden Rose Professor of Spanish and Portuguese and Director of the Whitney Humanities Center at Yale? I am half way through it and find it a remarkable book, beautifully written with all sorts of resonances to the present time and with, among other things, emphasis on the vernacular poetry and songs that developed in Arab Andalusia and spread to Norman Aquitaine. If you don't plan to review, it please consider doing so.

Michael Dirda: Yes, we have a review of it, I think,this sunday.

Accra, Ghana: Do you have any favorite Brazilian authors?

Jorge Amado seems the most frequently translated, and is entertaining, but repetitive and formulaic after a while. My own favorite, by far, is Joao Guimaraes Rosa. He wrote cowboy and bandit stories about Brazil's interior in a very beatiful, sensual style. His best known novel "Grande Sertao: Veredas" is told as the autobiography of a bandit chief. Interesting contrasts between how he describes things and how he must have been perceived, and an almost erotic attachment to one of his comrades. I think this book was translated as "The Devil to Pay in the Backlands." He also wrote beautiful stories about altered perceptions; two brothers arguing in a malarial delirium; a hunter cursed with blindness by a witch doctor trying to find his way through the forest by sound, feel, and smell; a narrative by a jaguar hunter who has lived alone in the woods so long his language is becoming jaguar-like.

Also Joao Ubaldo Ribeiro. He wrote (and then translated into English himself) Sargento Getulio, the story of a soldier charged with transporting a political prisoner through the Northeast of Brazil. The political winds shift and he finds himself pursued by the army, but refuses to abandon his original mission. A very violent character but an interesting perspective. Another one of his novels "Viva o Povo Brasileiro," is a nice historical novel. Don't know the title in translation.

There are plenty of others, too. I'm not sure why Amado seems to have such a lock on Brazilian literature in American bookstores.

Michael Dirda: I know of these writers, but the only Brazilian I've read at length is Machado de Assis, who is playful, ironic, very modern sounding. His books have been recently retranslated: the most famous used to be called, in an earlier translationk, Epitaph for a Small Winner.

Alexandria, Va.: You daydream, right? And you say you'd like to spend six months in Florida writing a book that would become a runaway best seller, a critical success, and the hottest cinematic property of the year.

Well, would you consider reviewing another daydreamer’s book? Just trying to get started, find an agent/editor.

Michael Dirda: no. I don't want any competition. In truth, I find reading other people's work to be sheer torture. If its' good I'm jealous, if it's bad, I hate to tell the truth.

Takoma Park, Md.: Frayn:

Wrote a great funny novel about computerization in the news business, called The Tin Men.

He's usually very funny and poignant. Headlong stank. Spies looks the same.

Michael Dirda: THe Tin Men is my favorite Frayn--I list it in my piece on great comic novels in Readings. I keep meaning to read Toward the End of the Morning, wihch is about Fleet Street and supposed to be even funnier.

New York, N.Y.: RE: Patagonia books
I would highly recommend "Road Fever" by Tim Cahill. It's an account of his drive from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego with a professional long distance driver who is trying to set a world record. It's a very amusing and fascinating read.

Michael Dirda: thanks

Fairfax, Va.: For the person looking for books on Australia:

Road to Coorain (sp?) by Jill Ker Conaway

A Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson

Michael Dirda: htanks

Arlington, Va.: Re. Atwood

I have always enjoyed Margaret Atwood's books, and believe Alias Grace and the Blind Assasin to be two of her best works.

Each time I read them both, I find that they constantly call in the question the authority of the narrator, which make the books that much more interesting to read, I think.

Michael Dirda: thank you for another view on these two books.

Washington, D.C.: To elaborate the the book design topic, I'd add to the discussion what can indeed be told by a book cover.

Michael Dirda: Good suggestion. Let's add it.

Herndon, Va.: My thanks to the "chat member" who mentioned the new George MacDonald Fraser book being published in the U.K. It's a non-fiction collection, and, I have no doubt, contains a good deal of ascerbic comments on our world today and why it's going to hell in a handbasket. The publishing date is this May. I, of course, have pre-ordered from the U.K. Amazon.com.

Michael Dirda: This does sound good. Fraser's Hollywood HIstory of the World--ie the way movies have depicted histroy--is a lot of fun, as well as authoritative. As I"ve said before, my favorite of his novels remains The Pyrates.

Cleveland Park, Washington, D.C.: What's the difference between science fiction and fantasy? I know each when I see it, but can't articulate the difference myself.

Also-any recommendations for someone who loved LOTR and the Once and Future King?

Michael Dirda: Look for our special issue two weeks back on sf and fantasy. Basically, in sf the world has been changed by science or plausible technolgoical/cultural developments; in fantasy, magic does the job. Both reflect back on the Real World of today.

Washington, D.C.: Damon Knight, sadly, passed away in the last week or so.

Michael Dirda: Yes. He will be much missed.

re:Protocols: I don't think the person was upset so much because they were selling it, but more because it is labeled as "history." Mein Kampf IS a historical work, Protocols is not.

Michael Dirda: thanks.

Mein Kampf vs Protocols: At least latter does not pretend to be anything else, and, perhaps, belongs to the history. The other one is a hoax and should be labeled as such. I find comparison lacking

Michael Dirda: thanks.

West Elkin: Hi Mr Dirda,

Thanks for your review a few weeks ago on "Haunting of L." I had just finished it and you gave me a few new perspectives in which to think about it. My question is, other than the three books being set in primarily Halifax NS in the 1920s, in what why can they be considered a trilogy? What thematic connections do you see them sharing? And, if I may, what do you think of the Pulitzer in fiction going to Russo's "Empire Falls?" (I thought it was a great novel.) Thanks

Michael Dirda: Glad you enjoyed the review. I'm glad Russo won Pulitzer. ANd suddenly I"m too tired to write more today--Howard Norman is an original and ingratiating writer, though.
Ok. So until next Thursday at 2--keep reading! We'll discuss dust jackets, book design, illustratoins and the physical character of books. Be aware that we may switch days for the rest of the spring sometime soon. so keep alert too!

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