Due to bad planning, I found myself without a book the other lunchtime. This caused some panic to old mister brain. The idea of an hour stranded in Canary Wharf without literary diversion? No, thank-you. CW is an cultural desert - there, I've said it. The shops are boring unless you like Ugg boots and sunglasses. So there's nuttin' to do. This causes introspection, and before you know it the river police are fishing you out of The Thames before sedating you and wrapping your quivering form in a foil blanket.
No, we can't have that, so I had to run off and buy a book. I have developed rather an addiction to reading, generally fiction. Most people look upon this as an admirable trait, but I see it just as another mania, and something that needs to be kept in check. Yes, one should read regularly and actively; it's good for the noggin. But if you find yourself getting the yips and trembling like a 15-year-old Pekingese because you've mislaid your copy of The Day of The Jeckal, then perhaps you need to cut down.
It's funny how class-riven matters like this are (in England too!) Reading is middle-class and is therefore always beneficial, the logic has it. But when you distill it down, literature is simply distracting oneself by reading a lot of pretendy words. How is that more worthy than watching John Craven's Newsround or Top Gear, say, or drinking fine wines for that matter? I contend it isn't, your honour.
Despite my reservations regarding its inherent merit, I ended-up studying literature at college. Luckily lit crit at undergraduate level dispenses with plot obsession - the colour of Mr Micawber's socks, for example - and is actually more akin to cultural studies, or social anthropology. The upshot of this is that I don't remember much about specific books, but know much more about the authors. It always brings people up short that a literature graduate can't remember the name of Pip's sister in Great Expectations, but there it is.
Pip, pip!
