The world is changing, but I am not changing with it. There is no e-reader or Kindle in my future. My philosophy is simple: Certain things are perfect the way they are. The sky, the Pacific Ocean, procreation and the Goldberg Variations all fit this bill, and so do books. Books are sublimely visceral, emotionally evocative objects that constitute a perfect delivery systemBooks that we can touch; books that we can smell; books that we can depend on. Books that make us believe, for however short a time, that we shall all live happily ever after.
Joe QueenanBooks did not need to be beautiful back in the Fifties, because nothing else was beautiful back then. Books were simply there: you read them because they were diverting or illuminating or in some way useful but not because the books themselves were aesthetically appealing.
Joe QueenanIf you have read 6,000 books in your lifetime, or even 600, it's probably because at some level you find 'reality' a bit of a disappointment.
Joe QueenanReading is the way mankind delays the inevitable. Reading is the way we shake our fist at the sky. As long as we have these epic, improbable reading projects arrayed before us, we cannot breathe our last: Tell the Angel of Death to come back later; I haven't quite finished Villette.
Joe QueenanOn this side of the Atlantic, the arrival of a new Woody Allen movie is always greeted with tremors of bliss by filmgoers past the age of 60, with mild curiosity by those in their 50s, with trepidation by those in their 40s, with fear and loathing by those in their 30s, and with complete indifference by anyone younger. An icon to baby boomers, who will never concede that when something is over, it is really over (Clapton, McCartney, Santana, the 1960s), Allen has not made a truly memorable film since Bullets On Broadway back in 1994.
Joe Queenan