Here’s something for Valentine’s Day.
Have you ever fallen out of love with a favorite author? Was the last book you read by the author so bad, you broke up with them and haven’t read their work since? Could they ever lure you back?
In college and for a time afterwards, I was obsessed with Umberto Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum. I must have read it at least 8 times. I read Eco’s other works, including his semiotics, and would have considered him a favorite author.
A few years ago I decided it was time re-read Foucault’s Pendulum. I delighted in the prospect of rediscovering a work that I remembered to be rich, suspenseful, mind-bending, and fun.
Sad to say, I found a book that was thin, tedious, obtuse, and dull. I think it’s a book that only makes sense to a pseudo-intellectual twit in his/her twenties.
I was disappointed, to say the least. And I also recently discovered that the movie version of Eco’s The Name of the Rose doesn’t hold up so well, either.
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16 responses so far ↓
1 gautami tripathy // Feb 14, 2008 at 10:24 am
The movie version does not hold well. However, the book does. I do like it.
My BTT post!
2 heather (errantdreams) // Feb 14, 2008 at 11:28 am
Our own age and views certainly impact our views on books, don’t they?
3 Superfast Reader // Feb 14, 2008 at 11:37 am
it’s sad
4 Walrus // Feb 14, 2008 at 12:34 pm
The Name of the Rose is a decent book. The sense of time and place is fantastic. It does drag sometimes, making me think he reproduced the unhurried medieval pace a little too well.
5 Superfast Reader // Feb 14, 2008 at 12:40 pm
LOL!
6 Ann // Feb 14, 2008 at 1:42 pm
I loved ‘The Name of the Rose’ the first time I read it but the second time I had to read it in a rush and found it impossible to read that way. I’m just hoping that at some point I will have sufficient leisure time to go back and read it for a third time and rediscover the pleasure of that first encounter.
7 Superfast Reader // Feb 14, 2008 at 3:53 pm
I should reread that one.
8 Mindy Withrow.com » Blog Archive » Clippings 9: I heart my readers // Feb 14, 2008 at 6:17 pm
[...] Reader describes “falling out of love” with a favorite author. (I wish I had fallen in love with Umberto Eco—alas, he’s never done a thing for [...]
9 Mindy Withrow // Feb 14, 2008 at 6:31 pm
This is such a great question, and I love your answer. Can’t come up with one of my own–probably because I tend to keep picking up new authors!
10 Superfast Reader // Feb 14, 2008 at 6:32 pm
you playah, you
11 Chris // Feb 15, 2008 at 8:35 am
I have The Name of the Rose sitting on my shelf. Someday I’ll get to it.
12 gentle reader // Feb 16, 2008 at 12:29 am
Have to say, I never fell out of love with Eco because I never fell in love with him. I couldn’t get through Foucault’s Pendulum, probably because I never even rose to pseudo-intellectualism when I tried to read him in my twenties. The author I fell out of love with was Ayn Rand…
13 trish // Feb 16, 2008 at 4:02 am
Oh, man! I have Foucault’s Pendulum in my TBR pile…hehe I guess that book will get bumped back until I’ve forgotten the bad review.
14 Superfast Reader // Feb 16, 2008 at 8:58 am
gentle–i’m sure you’re not the only one
trish–you should join chris & read “rose” instead–
15 meli // Feb 19, 2008 at 6:40 pm
oh The Name of the Rose is utterly wonderful, but I’ve never found Foucault’s Pendulum even vaguely temping. I’m stalled 3/4 the way through Baudelino at the moment, and will get back to it at some point, but it doesn’t hold a candle to The Name of the Rose.
16 Superfast Reader // Feb 19, 2008 at 9:02 pm
I didn’t read that one–published after I fell out of love–
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