What I've Been Reading

I've been reading or listening to several books lately, one of which is Pat Conroy's My Reading Life. The author, famous for writing openly about his abusive father, the four years he spent at the Citadel, and the one year he spent teaching, has written a book about other people's books--and about the teachers, writers, and friends who introduced him to many of the works he came to love.

What strikes me about all of Conroy's work--and I'm no expert--is his absolute openness. I could never reveal so much to so many. I hide behind characters, whereas Conroy tells us about his breakups and breakdowns, his relationship with his father, which improved greatly after The Great Santini, and his being fired at his first teaching job. It's a relief when he moves into the less traumatic moment of being insulted by Alice Walker. 

His openness, which may border on neurotic at times, becomes tonic for the reader, however, because it's what enables him to describe in voluptuous language the books he's loved and the people who helped him find or understand those books. I never thought I would want to read Gone with the Wind until Conroy convinced me of the greatness of that potboiler. His breath of knowledge about great books and great writers shames me and makes me feel as if I should do what I did during and for several years after college: keep the extensive list of books-every-Engish-major-should-have-read, given out by a professor at Georgia Southern University, on my desk, a single line drawn through each work the day I closed the back cover. Though some people might see going down such a list as being too methodical, I learned more about the world and about literature in those years than I would have and build a foundation from which to launch my literary curiosity.

I recommend My Reading Life for another reason as well: it gives one of the best descriptions of the writing life--tidbits of valuable information scattered throughout the chapters--that I've read. Not the how-to-write information. The this-is-what-the-life-looks-like-from-the-inside kind of information. Reading this should dispel the notion that writing is about wearing a beret and impressing strangers with your witty banter in the local cafe before you go home to dash off your great novel. Conroy points out that writers live predictable lives: they write every day, usually for several hours and at the same time. Every day. Same time. Several hours. Good writers take years to produce one book. One really good book.

I haven't read but a couple of Conroy's novels. I might have to backtrack and add a couple of them to the list I think I'll start tonight.