'As Glorious As Ever'

A reader in Texas tipped me to Michael Dirda’s column in Wednesday’s Washington Post. He was in Portland, Ore., to see family, and visited Powell’s Books. When we lived near Seattle, we made two trips to Portland, spending hours with the boys in Powell’s. From my desk I can see the copy of Chekhov’s Sakhalin Island I bought there. My reader is right on the money: 

“Although [Dirda] knows world literature, comparative lit etc., he tends too much toward genre. But I like to catch those moments when his and my interests coincide.”

 

Those may be the kindest words ever uttered regarding a critic or reviewer. We were without electricity for more than nineteen hours on Tuesday and Wednesday as the result of a thunderstorm. Plenty of time to read, little time to write. Dirda’s headline is a keeper:

 

“An afternoon inside a bookstore was as glorious as ever. Here’s what I bought.”