Reading

My bed bookshelf

I love to read.  The first book I read was a biography of Benjamin Franklin.  I was in sixth grade.  I sat in the back of the classroom.  Behind my desk was a wall long cabinet.  On top of that cabinet was a collection of orange books.  Those books were biographies of American historical figures, some of whom were  George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Alexander Hamilton, etc.

My Sixth Grade Class (I was absent the day this picture was taken - my desk was the third from the right in the back - my friend Billy B. is sitting at my desk)

Me when I discovered books 1953

No one encouraged me or told me to read those books.  I was bored by the class and curious as to what was in the books.  Up until that time the only reading I did were the Tom, Dick and Jane (and Spot) books, the books of Fifties elementary school.  Later I read the Weekly Reader.

Mrs. Yost, my sixth grade teacher who let me read 

I remember to this day picking up that first orange covered book biography of Benjamin Franklin.  I've forgotten a lot over the years but I remember holding that first hard covered book.  I opened it and glanced at the pages.  I was quickly drawn into another world, the world of the 18th century and Benjamin Franklin flying his kite in an thunder storm discovering electricity.  I asked my sixth grade teacher Mrs. Yost if I could take a book home to continue reading it.  She said I could.  It was from that point I was hooked on reading.

I quickly went through the collection of orange covered autobiographies.  I've often wondered if the color orange had a lot to do with luring me into reading those books because I so remember that warm, inviting color.

The Downingtown Public Library

After I finished that collection of books, someone suggested that I get a library card for the Downingtown Public Library.  The Downingtown Library was/is a grand old stone building located on the tree lined residential street that runs through Downingtown.  I still remember the wonderful smell of old books when I first walked into that wonderful, welcoming building.

I got my library card from the wonderful older woman (she was probably 40 but she seemed old to me) who sat behind a desk stacked with books.  It wasn't too long before my library card was filled with dates of books checked in and checked out.

From that day in 1953 until today, I have probably read thousands of books.

My favorite books are biographies, history books, and current events/political books.  I read some fiction but I don't read mysteries, science fiction or poetry.  I never got those books.  It doesn't mean there is anything wrong with those books, it's just that they bore me.

I read before I go to bed.  I read in the bathroom.  I read when I eat.  I read all the time.

What I'm reading now, "Include Me Out", Farley Granger's autobiography

I love reading.

Me reading in bed - my favorite bedtime activity...really

Sitting Pretty

Clifton Webb, Actor and Dancer Par Excellence

As regular readers of this blog know, I am a voracious reader.  My favorite reading material are biographies, especially celebrity biographies.  Coming in a close second are historical novels.  I have little or no interest in fiction nor mystery novels.

The celebrity biographies I have read this year so far are of Ava Gardener, Lucille Ball, Linda Darnell, Tab Hunter, Robert Mitchum, and Maureen O'Hara.  I just finished reading "Forever Dobie" which is the autobiography of Dwayne Hickman of Dobie Gillis fame.

All were interesting but totally different writing styles.  Some were written by the celebrities themselves and some by authors who never met the celebrities but wrote from interviews with those who knew the celebrities.  I enjoy reading all the biographies, no matter how badly they are written and some of them are pretty bad, believe me.  To me they are all fun reads.

But now I have found a true gem.  It is the biography of Clifton Webb.  The title of which is "Sitting Pretty".

Most of the readers of this blog probably don't know who Clifton Webb was.  Briefly, he was a somewhat acerbic and prissy actor born in 1889 who played John Phillip Sousa and Mr. Belvedere in films of the Forties and Fifties.  I always enjoyed seeing Clifton Webb in a movie.  He was the most unlikely leading man type, because of his prissy and effeminate nature.  As a ten year old soon to enter my teenage years I found myself oddly in synch with this wonderfully entertaining man.  No, he wasn't one of those movie actors that I had a crush on (that would be Farley Granger and Guy Madison) but I did feel "at home" when I saw Clifton on the silver screen.

Thus it was with great joy I discovered that a biography has just been published about him.  It is in hardback and costs almost $25!  I never pay that much for a book, I usually wait until it comes in paperback.  But I just had to have this book so I sprang for the higher price.

I was wondering how the book would read because part of the book is written in Mr. Webb's own hand and the rest was finished by an author who never met Mr. Webb, but instead worked from his numerous notes.  Clifton started to write his autobiography but by his own admission became "bogged down" and thus never finished it.  His handwritten notes were found in the basement of the daughter of the executor of his estate many years later by the author of this biography.

Clifton Webb never married.  It was assumed he was gay but of course back in those days such horrific information would spell the end to a movie career.  Most assumed Clifton lived in the closet but there was never any proof that he had any homosexual relationships.  He lived with his mother most of his life.

Thus it was a stroke of good fortune that the author of Clifton's biography found his unfinished autobiography and assembled Clifton's notes to publish the first an only biography of this wonderful and fascinating man, Clifton Webb.

Now here is the good part.  I started to read Clifton's biography and I am absolutely blown away at what a brilliant writer of prose that Clifton is.  Oh how I do love good prose.  It is so rare that I find a book that has good prose let alone a book about such an interesting man as Clifton Webb.  And what is really good about this book is Clifton's personality burst out of the pages that he writes.  WHAT A GOOD BOOK!

I find myself going back over and reading the same sentences and paragraphs just to savor the well honed prose and bask in the fascinating personality of this man.

I don't usually do reviews of books (or movies) but I am doing one now.  If you like to read a book about a fascinating man with a deadly, on target acerbic wit; this my friends is the one for you to read.

I wish I could recommend it to my friends but I'm afraid it is all over their heads which is sad.  Oh how I wish I had a friend like Clifton Webb today.  Now my friends, don't be offended.  I love the friends I have and appreciate them but I'm telling you, if I had a friend like Clifton Webb with his wit, charm, intelligence and talent; my head would probably explode.

One thing I know for sure, this is one book I am going to enjoy reading.  Just thought I would pass this along to all of you.

Books

Yesterday I made three trips to the new thrift shop open by Clear Space Productions. All three trips were made with boxes of books. One box I offered to help a friend and pick up and deliver his box of no longer wanted books. He doesn’t have the space to store them anymore. That encouraged me to finally start going through my books and make the hard decision as to what I no longer want to keep. I’ve been collecting books ever since I started to read books. I always wanted a library with walls of books. The first books I read I checked out of the Downingtown Library. I remember how comforting it was to browse through the library, looking for books I wanted to read. Back in those days (The Fifties), one had a library card. The books were checked out for two week intervals. If it took you longer to read the book (which it didn’t with me) you could extend your borrowing period. It didn’t take me long to fill up my library card. I felt so proud when I filled up one library card and the librarian had to issue me a new library card. I filled up many library cards during my elementary school years.

Over the years I have collected thousands of books. My first collections were paperback books. When I got a real job making real money, I joined the Book-of-the-Month Club (I don’t know if they even exist anymore.) Then I started to seriously collect books, thus building one book at a time that Wall of Books. When I built my home in Pennsylvania in 1981, I had built in bookcases in the living room. It didn’t take me long to fill up those bookcases. Bill persuaded me to part with most of my thousands of paperback books and I agreed. For the twenty five years we lived in Pennsylvania I finally had my own library. Then we moved.

Now I had to move thousands of heavy books. The moving company charged by the pound. This was going to be an expensive proposition moving all these books. It was an expensive proposition. I moved the books to my new home in Delaware. I don’t have a built in bookcase in my Delaware home. In fact, I don’t even have a separate living room which I could call “the library.” The books sat in their moving boxes until Bill started to unpack them last summer and put them in temporary bookshelves in the basement that he built. I had also purchased two unpainted bookcases (which I have yet to paint.) I will fill those new bookcases with the books I decide to keep.

Did I want another Wall of Books? Do I want a library? No, not really. Not at this point in my life. While I still enjoy a good book (I always have one of two books I’m in the process of reading – one at my bed and the other in my bathroom), I don’t need the Library. Thus, it was time to make the Big Decision. Which books are to go and which books are to stay?

Last summer I had began the process of “debooking” by offering many of my Time-Life series of books to Juan, my DirecTV repairman and former neighbor. He has two young children who would benefit from holding a real book with a lot of pictures instead of getting all of their information from the Internet. Yet, as many books as I gave to Juan, there were those books that I couldn’t give to him. His children wouldn’t be interested in these books. Many of those books wouldn’t be appropriate for youngsters such as Juan’s young son and daughter who hadn’t yet reached their teen years.

Thus it was with happiness and relief when a good friend told me that he and his partner were opening a new thrift store. The new thrift store is called Clear Space Productions Thrift Store. Clear Space Productions is a local theatrical company that trains local high school students in theatrical productions. Because of the economy, donations to their worthy cause have dropped. My friend’s partner noticed that other thrift stores in the area do very well. Thus he decided there was a market for another thrift store, especially a “theatrical” thrift store. And he was right. There is a definited niche in the local market for a "theatrical" focused thrift store.

I feel good that now I have a good home for all of these books that I have accumulated over the past 45 years. These books will enjoy a renewed life with their new owners. Again, someone will find comfort turning the pages of a real book. Maybe some of them will even find a home in a home library. Now if I can just find a home for the hundreds of LP albums that have been sitting in unopened boxes in my basement.