April 4, 2007

Sophisticate

Along the lines of childishness, I continue with my “boys adventure story” Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson. I am reading it based upon Hilary Mantel’s recommendation in her top ten favourite books listed in the back of Giving Up the Ghost, and I do like those lists. They’re recommendations from individuals I trust and respect, and I am glad to have my horizons thus broadened.

And so Kidnapped. This wonderful article from November 2005 quotes Mantel on how the book was formative for her as a reader and a writer. She identified with David Balfour as an outsider in a wild country. A great quote: “She dislikes it being said that she “escaped” into books. “When you read a novel or a play, it enlarges your own psychological repertoire. You see more choices that can be made. So it seems to me that by reading when you’re young, you sophisticate yourself.”