Thursday, December 04, 2008

Public Reading

For the first time in quite a while, I spotted somebody reading in public today. (Actually, Livia saw him first and pointed him out to me.) An older man sitting in a car in the local Wal-Mart parking lot was reading a paperback copy of Herman Wouk's THE CAINE MUTINY. I had a hard time not thinking about strawberries for a while.

8 comments:

Unknown said...

Wow, talk about forgotten books! How many whippersnappers remember that one? The book, not the movie, I mean. Or, for that matter, the movie, too.

James Reasoner said...

When I think of THE CAINE MUTINY, I think of three things: the novel (which I read when I was in the eighth grade), the movie (which I saw a year or two later), and the MAD Magazine parody of the movie from the early Fifties, which was reprinted in one of the early MAD paperbacks and which I read before I ever read the novel or saw the movie.

Seriously, though, it's a really good book. I prefer Wouk's earlier work to those later door-stoppers he wrote. (Although YOUNGBLOOD HAWKE could stop many a door . . .)

Charles Gramlich said...

I'm the only person I know who reads in public.

Anonymous said...

I always take a book when I'm going to the Doctor's office or some other place where I'll have to wait.

My daughter used to read a lot, then she discovered fan fiction and has been obsessively writing and drawing for that. When she was 7 or 8 I'd buy her a copy of the new Magic Treehouse books and she's be almost done by the time we'd get home.

Anyway my wife bought her the first book in this "Twilight" series because her fan writing had dipped into vampires. She read it in two books, then yesterday someone stole it from her while at school. I didn't know any of her classmates could read! Man, was she furious.

Perviously, I was glad, because it showed that she still likes to read.

Graham Powell said...

Not too long ago I was out to dinner and there was a family with a teenage daughter at the next table. She had a book in front of her face the whole meal, and I thought, "Ah! One of us!"

Graham Powell said...

Oh, and I never read THE CAINE MUTINY but I saw the movie. I mainly remember Jose Ferrer's speech at the end.

"If you wanna do something about it, I'll be outside. I'm a lot drunker than you, so it'll be a fair fight."

pattinase (abbott) said...

I see people reading on the bus quite regularly. An elderly woman reads Ellery Queen every day. It makes me feel quite joyous.

Cap'n Bob said...

I read in public. Usually I stand outside a ladies' restroom and read American Psycho.