It shocked me when I entered first grade and realized that most of my classmates could not read. It never occurred to me that teaching reading was one of the primary functions of grade school. My sister and I were taught to read at home. From when I was age four, my parents took us to the public library at least once a week. Reading was taken for granted, like cleaning one's room or brushing one's teeth.

There are times in my life when I read two or three books a week; at other times, my pace slows. (Sadly, discovery of computers and the Internet a few years ago has done more to decrease my reading time than has anything else.). Mostly, I read non-fiction: history, science, philosophy and biography. I read a great deal of psychology, although I despise pop psych and self-help books because the issues they purport to address, often of legitimate interest, are addressed perfectly well, without the glibness, in real psychology texts. Among my favorite non-fiction writers are Oliver Sacks, Richard Selzer, Stephen Jay Gould, James Gleick, John Hersey, Peter Matthiessen, John Allen Paulos, Ernest Becker, Alan Dershowitz, Primo Levi, Jane Goodall, Henry Petroski and Camille Paglia. In fiction, I favor writing that is direct, even blunt. I do not mind coarseness or profanity in my literature. My favorite fiction writers include Franz Kafka, Henry Miller, Charles Bukowski, Jean Genet, Philip Roth, Stanislaw Lem, Norman Mailer, Emily Prager, William Burroughs and Milan Kundera. When I find a writer I like, I tend to read everything he or she has written. I am an devotee of Ernest Hemingway and, early in my legal career, represented a group of scholars in seizing control of The Hemingway Foundation from Ernest's widow's estate lawyer. ("Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice." -- Goldwater). Another genre I read is avant garde adult comics. These are not to be confused with superhero comics for children. If you think about it, comics resemble written plays more than anything else, in that they consist of dialogue and visual cues. For those not familiar with it, there is an underground of comics writers, whose works treat serious issues, often with great insight, in what tends to be called "graphic novel" form. One of my favorite comics writers is Harvey Pekar, whose "American Splendor" series depicts the dry profundity in the life of the author, a file clerk in Cleveland, including his recent bout with cancer. Another comics writer I admire is Art Spiegelman, whose 1980-91 series "Maus" depicted the author's relationship with his father and the latter's experiences during the Holocaust, earning the writer a Nobel Prize. Recently I've come to admire David B. (born Pierre-Francois Beauchard), whose "Epileptic" tells the story of the author's childhood in France with the brother to which the book's title refers.  In newspaper strips I like Ben Katchor, whose "Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer" elicits extremes of praise or invective with its painstakingly detailed depictions of the title character's adventures in New York City's humble underbelly. I also like Max Cannon, whose "Red Meat" mocks mom and apple pie with twisted humor and a surprising sweetness. And of course there is Robert Crumb, who pioneered the underground comics genre in the 1960's.

I love to write as well. Ironically, the substantial writing I do on my job only increases my hunger to write in a way that is more personally connected and that permits reflection. I often write where others read. For example, I wrote this Web page on a beach in Montauk, Long Island, 8"x11" yellow pad pages flapping in the wind amongst the romance novels and horror paperbacks. I wrote this Web site's "Art" page in a morning fog on a fishing jetty nearby, glancing up every sentence in the hope of seeing action at the tip of my rod (alas, there was none). I write essays, long letters, travel journals and yes, the occasional comic strip. (Would that I could draw!) Do I wish to publish (beyond the Web)? Not really. Have I ever been published? Well, only if one counts a poem I wrote in 5th grade that somehow won First Prize at my school and was included in a hard cover children's poetry anthology called "Young Voices." The most frustrating form of writing, for me, is in on-line chat rooms. I tend to write slowly and with contemplation. Chat room occupants demand instant, careening responses and are more than willing to sacrifice depth -- and for that matter grammar, syntax and spelling -- to get them. I find such a practice repugnant.

Featured link:

Cynscribe Calligraphy Directory

Once upon a time....

Bookwire
Book Reporter
AllReaders.com
Bartleby Library
Poetry Web Ring
Project Gutenberg
Arts & Letters Daily
On-Line Books Page
Alibris (rare book store)
Words Without Borders
Online Literature Library
Reading Group Choices
Original Writing Web Ring
Merriam-Webster Dictionary
Shakespeare's Complete Works
American Booksellers Association
Online Book Clubs & Discussions
UbuWeb (avant garde poetry etc.)
Beinecke Rare Book Library at Yale
Camille Paglia's Salon column archive
YourDictionary.com (index of dictionaries)
Indy Magazine (guide to alternative comics)

-- Webzines & blogs (sort of literature):

Suck
Fray
Salon
Onion
Wired
GeekGirl
SatireWire
Disinformation
Urban Desires

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