Her Half-Turned, Half-Veiled Visage Haunts Me...

...every time I sit down to read. Meryl...

For thousands and thousands of years, books were just books. The early Greeks and Romans and Asian civilizations had books, of course, on long scrolls of papyrus or sheepskin. And if somebody wanted to publish, copies were painstakingly hand inked. And yes, perhaps at times in the intervening dozens of centuries books occasionally became something else; plays, most likely.

But these days, and for the past century or so, the most obvious and common reincarnation of a book is to become a movie (for simplicity's sake let's leave TeeVee out of this.)

And when a book becomes a movie, the book itself gets a new life.

I'm on vacation, and I'm reading John Fowles's The French Liutenant's Woman. (I'm in Virginia Beach again, and there are no RD Condensed books in this suite.)

Here, I'm going to digress and talk a bit about book covers.

Book covers are probably more important than one would casually think.

When we read a book, a good book, it takes us away. For a time we are part of another realm, with characters we get to know, and in a world that in one way or another, to a greater or lesser degree, balances within a universe substantially different than the one we occupy in our own everyday lives.

In a historical novel, the fundamental differences are both time and place. Yet, even were I reading a story set in the present day on the Virginia Coast, I would be inhabiting the thoughts and cares of others--both the author's and his characters'. Because of the familiarity of the place, and time, it might feel like a tighter fit, but still there would be that vicariousness, that escape from my own world.

And when we read a book, and lose ourselves in it, the cover--with its illustration, or photography, or geometric design--becomes a reference point, a touchstone, the familiar symbol of that world, that dilatory universe, the doorway that we knock on each time we pick up the book to read, and each time we close that world and re-enter our own.

But when books become movies, it is inevitable--and has been since probably the late 1940s--that chronology and precedence gets perversely reversed, and the pre-existing book now becomes a post-film tie-in, and a scene from the movie, frozen and captured, becomes the paperback's cover.

So in 1981, when the film version of The French Liutenant's Woman released, thousands and thousands of Meryl Streep's stared hauntingly out from the new paperback edition of the 1969 novel, on racks in mall book displays and grocery store checkout lines.

And to this day, Meryl continues her half-shawled, vulnerable, tortured method-acting gaze in thousands of flea markets, garage sales, and used book stores--though here and now, shelved spine out, she probably must stare, in the dark, at the back cover of Fowles's The Magus or The Collector. (Or E.M. Forster's A Room With a View?)

Because Fowles's novels are so rich and involving, so complete an immersion into a universe intricately designed and created, I have hesitated to view the film version--until I've read the novel. I wanted my experience of this novel--especially this novel--to be unsullied, uninfluenced by another's vision.

And, indeed, 4/5 of the way through the novel, Charles Smithson's 1867 England, and Victoria's world and empire as reflected through his eyes and soul, is fully created, revealed in pieces exactly as delivered, piece by exquisite piece, at the pace and in the order prescribed by Fowles when he wrote FLW in 1969.

But each time I sit down and open the book, and finish a chapter and close it, I am faced with Meryl's face.

Don't get me wrong, I completely understand why the publisher must use the film's imagery to tie in with the new edition. Marketing must resonate with the mind of the consumer, and Streep was already a star in 1981.

And she was undoubtedly well cast(1) for the role of Sarah Woodruff.

It has been nearly 40 years since I read The Lord of the Rings. Another rich world and universe, twice created, cast, and played--first by Tolkien, then by me. And by each enthralled reader of this wonderful trilogy.

Of course, when Peter Jackson, a director of horror films, cast Elias Wood in the leading role of Frodo, communities of readers (talk about a book that has many lives!!) revolted.

After that first film The Fellowship of the Ring, came out, the clamor about casting quelled. And I agree, the film was well cast, given the sacrifices that any film must make in transforming written vision to screen. Yet, for me, and I suspect many others, Hobbits cannot be adequately portrayed by humans.

Hobbits aren't simply small humans with hairy feet and pointed ears. They're another species. Their proportions and faces are different.

Yet, having seen the film, now, in my mind, it's difficult to not see Frodo as Wood.

When I went on vacation, I wanted to immerse myself in a good read, yet a thought-provoking read. I wanted to read Fowles.

When I picked up my paperback of FLW, and looked at the cover, I briefly considered seeking out an older edition. A pre-Meryl version.

But that would be silly.

Still, I sort of wish I had ripped the cover off.

Nothing against Meryl, but I would have preferred to cast it myself.

Condensed is For Soup, Not Books....but then again...

We were--all four of us--quite pleased with the timeshare unit: 33rd Street beachfront, second floor, overlooking the paved beach walk, foreground to the wide clean yellow sand stretching to the rolling Virginia Beach breakers. A sofa foldout for the kids in the living room, cable TV with VCR and DVD, a separate bedroom for me and Mom, two little balconies--all pretty cozy (read "tight") but comfortable. A nice dwelling for a week by the ocean.

And then, I saw the books. Three shelves of them, all hardbacks. Total, about 5 feet of literature. Almost instantly, though, I realized what these were, from the formulaic sameness of the spines...the consistent 1.25- to 1.5-inch widths, the characteristic four stacked titles in gold-serif lettering on rectangular panels, and I felt the warning blink in my brain...

"Step away from the condensations...." 37 volumes, ranging from 1954 (Night of the Hunter & three more condensations) to 1999 (Rainbow Six & three more distilled works) holding something like 160 separate titles...

I had brought along books to read, of course. And somehow I always lug along more than I end up reading. But within a day, between bike rides on the beachwalk and times with toes in the sand contemplating the Atlantic breakers...kite flying and delivering family pizzas...I was drawn back to the bookshelf...

This all happened about a year ago, but I was prompted to dig this out of my vacation notes and blog it, because 1) condensation is a way a book gets a new life, and that's what this blog is about and 2) recently I've read some articles about condensations returning to popularity.

First, as I looked over the books, I saw the following titles I'd already read the full versions of (parentheses represent the year of the RD series they're published in):

To Kill a Mockingbird (1960)
Papillon ('70),
The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax ('66)
Life With Father ('67)
The White Dawn ('71)
Love Story ('70)
Day of the Jackal ('72)
A Cry in the Night (read the condensation in RD, '83--hey, I was in the Peace Corps, no-doubt stuck on a weather-docked boat somewhere with nothing else to read)
Nathans Run ('96).

Some pretty good literature, some great page turners, some unforgettable adventure. Pretty good company.

It was partly because of my memories of these reads that I told my self, "Just one..." and laid aside my Bill Bryson, temporarily.

So I dusted off a 1958 volume, and selected a western. The Diamond Hitch by Frank O'Rourke. A gritty "present day" (1950s) western. It was very good. A young guy trying to make it in rodeo in Wyoming. Not a western in the "legendary" sense, not an "Old West" western. More realistic, more modern. Not at all hollywood or disneyesque (well, maybe just a smidge disneyoid.)

Then, in rapid succession, I read
Rose by Martin Cruz Smith.
Prospect by Bill Littlefield.
The Young Elizabeth by Jennette & Francis Letton.
And a Formula Spy Thriller by a spy thriller formulist whose name I can't remember either.

Rose wasn't bad. Best part of it was its historical background, child- and female- labor in English coal mines century before last. Smith and I go way back. Meaning, me as a reader, Smith as a writer. In the 70s, when he was plain Martin Smith, he wrote an alternate history titled The Indians Won. It may have been his first novel, and it wasn't very good. But he got better, much better, didnt he?

The Young Elizabeth was quite good. As in Queen Elizabeth, the Liz the Q1, the one with Essex and Cousin Mary of Scots and all. She had to get wise quickly, grow up, figure out how to survive in a vicious royal succession minefield milieu.

But reading condensations is like singlehandedly eating a bag of Cheetos. Tasty and satisfying at first. Then, by the time I got to the cheesy minor-league Prospect and the crime/spy/thriller, I'd had enough light crunchy goodness. I couldn't stop, of course, just like with Cheetos.

So, if you come upon three or four feet of these abbreviated books, don't step away from the condensations. Choose carefully, and you will likely find something you'll really like.

***

Topic for Discussion:

Beyond Reader's Digest Condensations, should there be more condensations, for a world that moves at a faster pace, for shorter attention spans? (Orion Books is condensing the classics!)

Better yet, maybe the Utne Reader, which I've always thought of as RD for progressive thought, should start offering condensations, picking from the more unique and quirky fringes of book publishing.

Hey, the Old Books blog has some Creative Ways of Using Readers Digest Condensed Books... 

Books Are More Interesting Than Ever...

At a time when people have less and less time to read, when the tide of literacy seems to be stalling, perhaps even beginning to ebb, when the internet, still in its infancy really, seems to be metamorphosing once again, this time shedding its textual skin, perhaps completely, and evolving ever more toward the graphical, the audible, the vidible...

Yet, books are getting better than ever. The written word is more exciting, more available, more democratic, more widespread, more expressive, in more niches, delivering more riches, and expanding into more minds than ever before.

While small bookstores are sputtering, and the megabarns that sell books have become entertainment and caffeine clubs, and libraries are losing funding, and big publishers have cut imprints and staff and creative departments and marketing budgets, and half of the used bookstores that used to pepper my area are gone.

New authors are thriving. They’re publishing their own work, or publishing on Lulu or Ipublish or Iuniverse or the 168 other vanity and POD and PQN services.

And then there’s Oprah…

In this web of publishing contradiction, this mix of positive and negative, this crazy quilt of wonder and information and fascination that the internet and information explosion has made of the fields of books and authors and publishing, I, W. Town Andrews Jr. am going to write about the new lives of books.

Books have websites and blogs and podcasts and festivals and panels and roundtables and conferences and talks and readings and review sites and review discussion sites and wikis and television shows and movies and more…..

We are entering a time when one can love books, live books, eat, breathe and sleep books…………without ever opening or reading a book!!!

The UnheardofBooks.com Books Beyond Print Blog is about these new ways of enjoying and interacting with the book world. Beyond print, beyond reading.

Books aren’t just books anymore.