A Book Meme

... lovingly nicked from Bart's Daze of Our Lives.



1. Hardcover or paperback, and why?
The only time I prefer paperbacks is when I'm travelling. Every other time, hardcovers win. The feel of the pages, the crisp spines, the dust jacket that you guard from harm as jealously as a mother would a newborn babe, the scent of ink and paper, the heft of the tome in your hands as your curl up to read... Hardcover.

2. If I were to own a book shop I would call it…

Words Worth Eating. And it would have a small cafe, naturally, with big arm chairs where people could just plop down and stay. I'd love for it to look just like Wordsworth's house:



3. My favorite quote from a book is…
Okay, I protest — this is like asking one to choose a favorite child. But the first quote I ever copied from a book was when I was 12:

"I love him; and that, not because he's handsome, Nelly, but because he's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same."
— Emily Brontë, The Wuthering Heights

That quote still informs my life.


4. The author (alive or deceased) I would love to have lunch with would be …

My boy Bill of course! D'uh! I'd probably feel like a right dolt, but it would be an opportunity not to be passed up.



5. If I was going to a deserted island and could only bring one book, except the SAS survival guide, it would be…

My Riverside Shakespeare. Everything one could wish for in entertainment can be gleaned from the pages of that book. And I don't think I could survive without it.

6. I would love someone to invent a bookish gadget that…

dusted the books without damaging them. A little robot vacuum that was lighter than air that would just "zwoompf" the dust off throughout the bookcase.

7. The smell of an old book reminds me of…

afternoons spent with my dad in antiquarian bookstores, rummaging through shelves and boxes for books he was collecting, the sunlight shining through dingy windows, the dust motes floating lazily in the air.

8. If I could be the lead character in a book, it would be…

Frodo in The Lord of the Rings.



9. The most overestimated book of all time is…

James Joyce's Ulysses. Funny, I didn't have to think about this answer for even a second. Brand me a heathen, but I think that book is unintelligible drivel, pseudo-genius stroking, afforded far too much adulation by the Pretenderati.

10. I hate it when a book…

ENDS. After a good book ends, I go through a mourning period, grieving the fact that the book is over. And though I know I can always read it again, I'm grieving that I can never read it again,
for the first time.


If anyone would like to do the meme, please do so! I love little better than finding out what others love about books.