Prefaces

No, reading for me is something more like beginning a relationship. It is total freedom, anarchy. That’s what I love about reading. It’s why I love prefaces, introductions, prologues, forwards, all the layers you are invited to peel off before you see the meat of the book. It’s like foreplay. The preface invites you in – come get to know me better. It’s the delicious, arch, conversation with someone you know will let you enter their intimate spaces later. Some author’s introductions are quirky – this is not how I feel now, but it was true then so I have let it stand. And that’s how love should be. We were (I pray) totally in love with each of our former lovers. That made us who we are now. Although that is now past, it’s not true to say we don’t love them anymore. Those passions lie quite close to the skin, we are palimpsests of past loves. How I hate writers who revise.
Some books don’t bother to tease and entice. The short book you can’t put down, like a one night stand. So exciting. Nothing wrong with that. And then the books you have to protect yourself from. Better double-bag your mind or you’ll start talking like those brutish men who seem so necessary in that thriller/crime novel world. Don’t let yourself share too much with them. Wouldn’t want to act that way. God forbid you start to write that way.
Then you have those special books that take a long time to read. At the end you stay up late into the night, desperate to reach the conclusion and reluctant to let go. Strangely like the moment of orgasm – inevitable but also (for unfortunate men anyway) the sign that, for tonight, this experience is almost over.
Some books we return to again and again. They nourish us. It’s fruitful. They shape our action, thoughts, inspire new writing. Our faithfulness to these partners in procreation is limited. We still stray to many other partners. But those big, important books always welcome us back, confident of their rank on our private top ten. Like a lover we’ve known for years – different every time, but always like coming home. I like to be promiscuous. I’ve got lots on the go at once. The book-me, the book-mark, slips inside the covers of many volumes. Nudging through the opening pages into the intense union offered inside.
Sometimes I’m playing a part. In this book I can be a woman. In another I can imagine what it’s like to be a “man” (ugh). Some books offer the delight of voyeurism. No need to get too close. Just watch this!
Each book is a conquest. We kiss and tell, we boast. Have you been there? Did you enjoy it? So many books, so little time. How delightful when you read something no-one’s heard of. A secret love.
Perhaps we are questing for a book that would be constantly satisfying. One we’d never finish, never want to leave. A book written for me alone. An unwritten, impossible book. The unattainable.