The Past is Now

Abstract

(One Hundred Thousand Billion Poems, Composition no. 1, Hopscotch). Some of them offer scandalous stories (Story of the Eye, Story of 0); others retain the power to shock, long after they have been appropriated and enshrined in the canon (Against Nature, Ubu Roi, Naked Lunch). As much as it pains me to admit it, some perfect books are maddeningly-and without a doubt intentionally-obscure (The Making of Americans, Tomb for Five Hundred Thousand Soldiers). Others persuade us that conspiracies are afoot, and preferably phony ones (Foucault's Pendulum, Dump This Book While You Still Can!, Fourbi). Perfect books must be perfectly reflexive (The Counterfeiters, Doctor Faustus, Ficciones, How I Wrote Certain of My Books, Why I Have Not Written Any of My Books). Perfect books should offer us perfect moments. For me (if perhaps not for the Anny of Nausea) the most perfect expression of the perfect moment is when Perceval gazes, transfixed, at the three drops of blood in the snow. Why aren't there more moments like that in the books I read? Perfect books should assure us that too much is never enough (Under the Volcano, The Ginger Man, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Dark Night of the Soul). Perfect books should tell us that it's OK to say no (Bartleby the Scrivener), and they should persuade us that there's nothing wrong in spending a day, a week, a month or longer flat out on our couch (Oblomov, The Bathroom). Finally, some perfect books must be perfectly obsessional, perfectly tailored for perfectly obsessed readers (The Confessions of Zeno). Should the existence of such a breed one day be confirmed, that is. As a reader (and I am first and foremost, in my present incarnation, a reader), I have always looked for books that combine each and every one of those qualities in perfectly resonant harmony. And some day soon, I fervently hope to come upon just such a book. Or perhaps-mirabile dictu!-a whole shelf of such books. Is that truly too much to ask? University of Colorado