A Reading Diary: A Year of Favourite Books [Illustrated] [Hardcover]

Alberto Manguel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 16, 2005

While travelling in Calgary, Alberto Manguel was struck by how the novel he was reading (Goethe's Elective Affinities) seemed to reflect the social chaos of the world he was living in. An article in the daily paper would be suddenly illuminated by a passage in the novel; a long reflection would be prompted by a single word. He decided to keep a record of these moments, rereading a book a month, and formed A Reading Diary: a volume of notes, impressions of travel, of friends, of public and private events, all elicited by his reading. From Don Quixote (January) to The Sign of Four (October) to The Wind in the Willows (December), Manguel leads us on an enthralling adventure in literature and life, and demonstrates how, for the passionate reader, one is utterly inextricable from the other.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Writer and critic Manguel's (Reading Pictures) elegantly elliptical and wryly contemporary diary of cities revisited and books reread during 2002 and 2003 opens with a journey he undertakes to his birthplace, Buenos Aires, just after Argentina's economic crisis in December 2001. As Manguel's reading overlaps with jotted observations of Buenos Aires, he reflects on the meaning of homeland, and on memory. Nostalgia and the significance of cities—in personal and literary terms—are themes that preoccupy Manguel on further trips to London, Paris, Germany and Canada. Yet Manguel is less melancholic than thoughtful and joyfully postmodern. At home in rural France, his reflections range as widely as on his travels, emerging as he tidies his library, converses with writers Mavis Gallant and Rohinton Mistry, and receives visits from his adult children. His eclectic reading matter includes H.G. Wells, Conan Doyle, Margaret Atwood, Kipling and Goethe. And he quotes from many more writers: Chateaubriand, Virginia Woolf and Chesterton, to name but a few. Manguel delights in list making—whether of favorite detective novels, mad scientists or literary heroes. Manguel's exquisitely distilled style and gentle humility are pure pleasure. His diary is a gold mine of the unexpected, and his companionable, deeply cultivated persona will entrance all those who love to read and to ponder.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

An exceptionally responsive reader, a discerning and cosmopolitan literary scholar, and the author of the much cherished A History of Reading (1996), Manguel writes about books with an enlivening mix of autobiography and criticism that now finds felicitous form in a two-year diary chronicling his rereading of a set of beloved books. This is a time-honored tradition, but Manguel's approach is unique in his selections, his perceptions, and his savoir faire. An Argentine who became a Canadian citizen and who has traveled and lived all around the world, Manguel counts among his favorites Sherlock Holmes and Don Quixote, Kipling and Goethe, H. G. Wells and Margaret Atwood, Memoirs from Beyond the Grave and The Wind in the Willows. Manguel muses on the resonance and relevance of these works and many others, while simultaneously recounting his journeys to such places as Buenos Aires, Newfoundland, and Sweden, and sharing the quiet pleasure of setting up his extensive library in his new (yet very old) home in France. (See p.214 for a review of Manguel's literary mystery.) Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Canongate Books; illustrated edition edition (June 16, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1841956384
• ISBN-13: 978-1841956381
• Product Dimensions: 7.2 x 5.5 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,448,346 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Internationally acclaimed as an anthologist, translator, essayist, novelist, and editor, Alberto Manguel is the bestselling author of several award-winning books, including A Dictionary of Imaginary Places and A History of Reading. He was born in Buenos Aires, moved to Canada in 1982 and now lives in France, where he was named a Chevalier de l'Ordre français des Arts et des Lettres.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars "I realize that I think in fragments", November 5, 2005

By 

A. Ross (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflections on a Year of Books (Hardcover)

About 3/4 of the way through Manguel's account of rereading one of his favorite books every month for a year, he writes "I realize that I think in fragments". This self-enlightenment serves as pretty good summation of his slim combination of literary criticism and memoir. Over the course of his project, he sets up a new home in rural France, takes trips to his native Argentina, Canada, Sweden, Germany, Italy, and the UK, hosts visits from his adult children, and follows the buildup to the war on Iraq. All the while, his rereading occurs, and he manages to tease out relevant insights from his favorite works in a kind of free-associative rambling. A longtime editor, anthologist, and writer, Manguel is something of a professional reader, and can seemingly draw upon a vast trove of quotations and passages at will. Thus, there appear quote after quote from a wide range of texts from which Manguel draws parallels to the one he's reading at the moment. It's rather daunting to be confronted with such a wide-range of knowledge and anecdote, and it's to Manguel's credit that it never once seems like showing off or obscurantism. That said, only a certain kind of person is likely to really enjoy the book, and a quick listing the twelve books he reads is likely to be a very useful guidepost:

The Invention of Morel (Adolfo Bioy Casares)

The Island of Dr. Moreau (Wells)

Kim (Kipling)

Memoirs From Beyond the Grave (Chateaubriand)

The Rule of Four (Doyle)

Elective Affinities (Goethe)

The Wind in the Willows

Don Quixote (Cervantes)

The Tartar Steppe (Dino Buzzati)

The Pillow Book (Sei Shonagon)

Surfacing (Margaret Atwood)

The Posthumous Memoirs of Bras Cubas (Joaquim Maria Machado De Assis)

So, essentially, a collection of eight world classics, several of which are "entertainments", one modern (ie. written in the last 50 years) novel, along with three relative obscurities. It goes almost without saying that the more of these you've read, the more likely you are to enjoy Manguel's ruminations of them. In sum, I have to admit that this is not at all the kind of writing I enjoy, but I know friends that would love it, and so it all comes down to personal taste. I did enjoy the profusion of lists that pop up in the book, as well as some odd little tidbits of history here and there and insights on the act of reading. I also found it rather amusing that one point, amidst all this rather high-culture rummaging, he mentions having read Thomas Harris's thriller "Hannibal" on the train.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A delightful year in a few hours, January 29, 2005

By 

Charlus "charlus" (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflections on a Year of Books (Hardcover)

Alberto Manguel has repeatedly shown himself to be good company to spend time with and this brief book only shores up that impression further. Each chapter is devoted to a different book he has read over the course of a year and the thoughts and associations that reading brings. It is part diary, part literary criticism, part commonplace book. For a man who has devoted himself to a lifetime of reading and writing, and who has lived an extraordinary global existence, the anecdotes and quotes he can pull together make for a enriching "conversation" spent in this man's company. A year's holiday for any reader, in the space of a few hours.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A wonderfully well-read book, January 15, 2006

By 

Tanya Abramovitch "The Library Girl" (Montreal, QC) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflections on a Year of Books (Hardcover)

Unlike other `Reading Year' books, this one is concerned with revisiting old literary friends. Manguel chooses a single book a month and, in diary form, relates it to his current activities and life parallels. He selects his titles in advance, an eclectic mix from all over the world.

This short book oozes with erudition, and Manguel liberally sprinkles excellent quotes, observations, lists, and anecdotes throughout the text, all the while contemplating the larger questions of home, justice, nostalgia, memory, and war, among others. This meandering but thoughtful recording of a year of the author's life is extremely well-done.