On Reading Habits

The author, Will Self, has come under fire for admitting to reading up to 50 books at a time - electronically, dipping in and out.

The reaction was predictable. He must be lying. "I stop reading Dickens cos it's so boring, therefore everyone else must!" is the cry. It made me wonder: how can anyone know what anybody else's reading habits are like? At university, I was always reading several books a week: the primary texts we were studying; a smattering of secondary texts; and then a novel or two on the side which had nothing to do with my courses.

These days, I'm usually reading about ten books or so at a time, at various stages. I read, re-read; sometimes I'm looking at a book for the third, fourth or even fifth time. As a book reviewer, I always have the tome I'm currently working on - at the moment,  it's three: a work of fantasy for the TLS; a children's book for the Guardian in the pipeline; and a novel for The Spectator.

Some I've only just begun, some I'm a long way through. I'm reading G K Chesteron's The Napoleon of Notting Hill, which I dip into when I can for some prescient light relief. Since I'm giving a lecture soon on Paradise Lost, I'm studying a book about the poem by Loewenstein, as well as the poem itself and the introduction to it in the Penguin edition. I've been reading - or perhaps that is the wrong word; absorbing might be better -  The Shorter Pepys for about ten or more years now - a month at a time, savouring his love of pies and his trips down the river and his delight in acquiring new clothes.

Frances Wilson's Guilty Thing is a fabulously well written biography of Thomas de Quincey; I'm drinking it down it alongside Confessions of An Opium Eater, which I'm re-reading. I've been perusing a book by Norman Davies called Vanished Kingdoms, about the kingdoms, large and small, which once dotted Europe; in almost total contrast to this serious work, I'm half way through the second volume of Simon Raven's amusing and louche Alms to Oblivion Series, which I read a few pages of before sleep, as a kind of tonic.

I've been completing my awareness of Henry Green for some time, being half way through the final novel of his that I haven't yet read, Concluding; alongside this I'm dipping into his contemporary, Evelyn Waugh, simply because my old copy of Brideshead Revisited turned up, and I couldn't help but immerse myself in it again. (Funny to think that everyone thought Green would be read long after Waugh.) A biography by Hannah Pakula of Queen Victoria's daughter, Princess Victoria, who married the future Emperor of Germany, has been keeping me company in the small hours. Yesterday, I re-read Hamlet, because I'm teaching it next term; today, I'm looking again at Webster's The Duchess of Malfi, each time finding new resonances and mirror images.

Is this bragging? Or is it just part of the way that I read? Reading, to me, is so much a part of life, that I would not be able to live without it; and that, of course, feeds in to writing. Why roll your eyes when someone says they're reading something "difficult"? Why not, instead, try it yourself? You never know - you might find something worthwhile. There's many books on the shelves, and one of them, somewhere, will set your soul on fire in a way that Dan Brown never can.

A Brace of Booker Books: The Lighthouse by Alison Moore, and Swimming Home by Deborah Levy

Dan Stevens: Judge

Morning all: I've reviewed a couple of Man Booker longlisted novels for The Telegraph - The Lighthouse by Alison Moore, and Swimming Home by Deborah Levy. Both are brilliant, skewed, original and gripping. Click on the links to read the reviews. Dan Stevens (pictured, as Matthew Crawley in Downton Abbey) is one of the judges that chose an interesting longlist - much more so than last year, I think - and one that clearly favours experimentation. I'd say that Michael Frayn, Hilary Mantel, Will Self, Nicola Barker and André Brink were dead certs for the shortlist, but with a list like this it's hard to guess. Number six could be Ned Beauman or Deborah Levy; I don't think Alison Moore or Jeet Thayil will make it on. We wait with breath bated...


 

Groovin With Diamonds: Launch Party for Nicola Shulman's Book

To Chelsea, and to the First Party of the Summer (official), for the launch of Nicola Shulman's new biography of Thomas Wyatt, Graven with Diamonds. A fire gently crackled in the hearth, whilst outside in the garden it was musky and warm enough to not wear a jacket even as twilight fell. Champagne was abundant. The author thanked her family in her speech, not least for their efforts in googling 'Graven with Diamonds' to see if anyone else had ever used it as a book title: 'Grooving With Diamonds' was the nearest that they came to it. The book has been in gestation since Nicky was at Oxford (the clipping shows her modelling at the time, from an interview that appeared in the Evening Standard HERE), and the author said it was an absolute dream to see it out there and on the shelves (and beautifully produced by Short Books). Guests feasted on little steaks, mini-half burgers of exquisite taste; quails' eggs of truffled hue; the canapés were of Henrician quantity and enough to satisfy the feasting habits of a whole court of early-modern quaffers. We were only short of a whole roasted hog. Several people (including me) managed to fall down the stairs, despite the fact that there were only three (and they were broad and flat, too).

Present were the extremely tall Will Self and his wife Deborah Orr; the novelist Cressida Connolly and her family, including beautiful daughters Violet and Nell; satirist Craig Brown, whose face beams from under a frizz of hair; writer Ferdinand Mount sitting on a sofa; explorer Sara Wheeler, historian Antonia Fraser, poet Edward Barker, editrix Rachel Johnson; a full complement of Phippses and Shulmans of all generations, and many bookish and non-bookish types alike, who caroused until the early morning. When Nicky came into the garden after her speech she received a standing ovation; we were later treated to a reading by the author of 'Whoso List to Hunt'. There was no actual grooving (unless you count the falling down stairs); there may have been some diamonds; but we certainly heartily grooved with diamonds in spirit. I am sure that the shade of Thomas Wyatt looks down and approves.

PORT Magazine: Lift Off

Last night was the launch party for a new venture by Dan Crowe - PORT Magazine, an intelligent style guide for men, of which I'm a Contributing Editor. The first issue has been printed and it commands attention: the name of the magazine is in raised gold letters, and the names of the contributors and interviewees are printed below: Daniel Day-Lewis doing a piece about Palestine, an interview with actor Tahar Rahim; a letter by Samantha Morton; pieces from Jon Snow, Frank Skinner and Will Self. It's a great idea, harking back to a time when magazines published intelligent and in depth pieces.

The party took place in Dunhill's shop in Mayfair: champagne, salmon, ham; a humidor; there was a croquet set but I didn't quite pluck up the courage to set it up. Brett Anderson from Suede loomed; Jon Snow was there (apparently biking, as he was wearing a yellow reflective jacket.)

Here's to Port's continuing success.