Author introductions get in the way of great literature
My wife and I have been reading classic literature this year. She finished Jane Eyre last week before starting Great Expectations, and I tackled Out of Africa and Old Man and the Sea before moving to Robinson Crusoe. We both agree: it’s inspiring stuff—and much better than junk food reading.
We also agree that those wordy, overblown, or otherwise melodramatic introductions by semi-popular modern authors are lame. I understand it’s a marketing ploy to sell more re-released books, and you can always skip ’em. But they get in the way of great literature. I have yet to read an author introduction that I enjoyed. Let me get to the book already, or at least call the thing an “author retrospective” and put it in the back of the book.
Dumb.
3 Comments
The same thing applies when you go to an awards ceremony. A few years ago I went to an Entrepreneur luncheon. The person who was supposed to introduce the winner talked for more than 25 minutes. Everyone was muttering – “why won’t this guy shut up?” We got to hear about 10 minutes from the honoree – from whom most of us would have liked to hear more.
The problem is that people giving introductions too often are trying to make themselves look good, rather than the subject of the introduction. In the process, they end up looking like a hanger-on.
I always, ALWAYS skip the introductions of books. ALWAYS.
Have you considered a kindle. All the classic books are free and you can store all of them in its memory. It is the best thing I have purchased in the last 5 years.