Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Great minds think alike

Alice posted this on my Facebook wall last night, and dare I say it? Someone stole my idea!


This is exactly what I was contemplating doing with the stack o' books I brought home from the Open Books sale, except I'd be using my laptop's webcam for that extra dose of gritty teenage realism. Maria Bamford's an actual comedian so this is probably funnier. Thank you Alice!

In other recognizing-myself-in-others news, here's an article from the Telegraph titled "The high-brow readers with a taste for low-brow e-books" which reveals that people like e-readers because they can read stupid novels without anyone else knowing. The headline is a weird misfire since it seems to want to snicker at hypocritical posturing eggheads which, maybe I'm wrong, is not a sentiment likely to appeal to readers of the Torygraph. Anyhow, here's a winner of a quote from the company that ran the survey:
“It seems that a lot of people are quite glad that when it comes to ereaders you can’t judge a book by the cover. Perhaps it’s this combination of being able to keep our literary truths discreet coupled with the British reserve that has made the ereader such a hit in the UK.”
This guy is a journalist's dream.

To pull these two items together -- people having the same great ideas, people reading slightly embarrassing books on e-readers -- I will note that I have just bought The Help for Kindle in anticipation of Alice's Help! I Have Not Read The Help read-along. She posted the schedule the other day, go check it out. There are only five days until November and the read-along start, yikes. In the meantime I am reading and enjoying The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt, which I will hopefully have some preliminary comments on soon.

Urrrg, I am really not ready for November!!

2 comments:

  1. "It's like, Chicken Soup for the Bullshit."

    I, for one, am glad I don't have to be seen reading The Help on the El. Thanks, anonymous Kindle!

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  2. What a quandary!

    If I get an e-reader, how will I impress people on the L by my high-brow fiction reading habits?

    On the other hand, I wouldn't have to be embarrassed getting caught reading "stupid novels".

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