The Story of the I

So what am I reading at the moment, you ask?

Well, when I’m not familiarising myself with everything that’s ever been written on, around, or relevant to the subject of the lunatic judge D.P. Schreber (and there’s a lot of it – a hundred years’ worth and counting) or boning up on writing exercises for teaching next year, I’ve got to the point now where I only read books by people I’ve met.

One of the downsides of being around writers is that you have to read their work just in case they happen to mention it. They don’t like it when, after they’ve said ‘I did something similar in my novel The X of Y’, you reply ‘never read it. What’s it about?’ You can try to bluff but it’s hard work – all it takes is for them to ask you what you thought of some plot point and then all the smiling and nodding and ‘yeah, yeah’-ing in the world isn’t going to help you. It’s easier just to read it.

Trouble is, there are about twenty novelists (I’m guessing) hanging about at UEA with a combined oeuvre of more than a hundred books, so I have to prioritise. I’ve started with the best received novels of the people I’m most likely to have a reasonably long conversation with. After that I’ll work my way through to the difficult second novels and those writers who only occasionally poke their heads round. One day I hope to be able to walk the concrete pathways of UEA without having to duck out of the way of people I haven’t read yet. I just wish the buggers would stop writing new stuff: it’s difficult enough as it is.