More than a century ago Emily Dickinson wrote: "There is no frigate
like a book To take us lands away." She couldn't have known that
some 125 years later denizens of Bookreporter.com would echo that
thought. Never before have readers had so many choices and such
diverse styles ("frigates") from which to select their reading material.
For the avid reader --- or even the casual reader --- the choice
is not so much what to read as it is where to begin.
Dick Francis comes to my mind when reading the second line of Dickinson's
poem: "Nor any coursers like a page of prancing poetry." Virtually
all of Francis's novels revolve around racehorses. His protagonists
are either jockeys or friends of jockeys. Francis knows whereof
he writes --- he rode championship coursers for years before he
made writing his career. His love of prancing poetry shows through,
whether his chief character is a glassblower as in SHATTERED or
a weatherman as in SECOND WIND. His low-key style of writing does
nothing to lessen the suspense.
Every good writer creates his own frigate to take us lands away.
Andrew Vachss's Burke, ex-convict and current lawbreaker, uses a
destroyer. John Sanford's Lucas Davenport drives a Porsche. John
D. MacDonald lives on the houseboat he won in a poker game. Robert
Parker's Spenser uses a rowboat on the river near his office, though
Parker's Irish emigrants traveled steerage on an ocean liner in
ALL OUR YESTERDAYS, the title taken from one line of Macbeth. Tony
Hillerman's Jim Chee, Arizona State University college educated
and FBI Academy trained, uses a late model car to patrol the Navaho
reservation and, as a bonus, enjoy spectacular Arizona scenery.
Dean Koontz and Stephen King use --- what? A ghost ship?
There is indeed no frigate like a book.
Source: Poem #1263, written c.1873, from THE COMPLETE WORKS OF
EMILY DICKINSON, edited by Thomas H. Johnson.
--- Chuck Lang (Luck 87@AOL.com)
