The Uncommon Reader is a delightful little book by Alan Bennett, the Tony-winning British playwright. He imagines that the Queen happens upon a bookmobile and feels obliged to take out a book. This sets in a motion a wholesale change in her very being. She grows to love reading so much that she starts to resent—and even shirk—her many royal duties. She even starts to think of other people in a new way, to regret the many missed opportunities she had to have interesting discussions with famous authors, and to fancy herself a writer too. But no one, except for her "partner in crime," a bookish kitchen servant, understands her newfound passion:
Nor initially did she discuss her reading with anyone, least of all in public, knowing that such a late-flowering enthusiasm, however worthwhile, might expose her to ridicule. It would be the same, she thought, if she had developed a passion for God, or dahlias. At her age, people thought, why bother? To her, though, nothing could have been more serious, and she felt about reading what some writers felt about writing: that it was impossible not to do it and that at this late stage of her life she had been chosen to read as others were chosen to write.
This was a really fun (and quick) read, and I also got a chance to learn a few Britishisms. I learned that duff is British slang for worthless, an equerry is "an officer of the British royal household in personal attendance on the sovereign or a member of the royal family," and a skivvy is a female domestic servant (although in this book a male kitchen worker describes himself as one). I did not figure out what dolly means as an adjective, but from the context I think it means attractive. The CH refers to the Order of the Companions of Honour, an honor that the Queen can bestow on a civilian, who then gets to append the initials CH to the end of their name. (Woo-Hoo!) The most recent recipient of the CH was Sir Ian McKellen—and holy cow, he is also a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) and got knighted too! I just love the expression "to bowl [someone] a googly," which comes from cricket and means "to surprise [someone]; to introduce [to someone] something unexpected, underhand, or requiring a quick reaction or correction." The sample sentence given in the Wiktionary is "Fred bowled me a googly when he asked me to explain those statistics in the meeting."
oooh, I love book reviews almost as much as I love to read! And speaking of reading, one of my friends blogs over at another site from time to time and they're giving away some books this week. Check it out...
http://www.constantchatter.com/2008/03/17/giveaway-a-chance-to-win-two-books/428
Sorry I don't know how to embed my links - I should learn how to do that already.
Posted by: LA Blogger Gal | March 17, 2008 at 02:03 PM