Reading, reading...

The pictures are of course, by my hero, my God, Giambattista Tiepolo, his illustration of the story of Armida Abbandonata (which, of course, originally, is a part, if not the whole, of Torquato Tasso's Gerusalemme Liberata), the libretto of which, by Francesco De Rogatis, was turned into a most wonderful opera lirica by Niccolò Jommelli, first performed at the Teatro San Carlo di Napoli on May 30th, 1770--which, I, with ravishment and astonishment, heard for the first time on ¡Tunes Radio yester morning. The young (14 year old) Mozart was at that first performance, and what he said about it has been tickling us ever since: "Beautiful but too serious and old fashioned for the theatre." Honestly, there is no ass so pompous as a kid. Anyway, the lovely, lovely paintings were the interior decoration of a private palazzo in Venice, which some rich American bought up in the last century and carried off to Chicago-where probably they are better protected and more accessible to the general public than in the Wicked Old Days in la Serenissima. Let us hope so, for they are lovely indeed.

But none of the above has anything to do with the topic of today's blog: Reading Popular Fiction, Horror and Science Fiction. I forget, have forgotten, most of the reading I have done in my life which has given me the greatest unalloyed pleasure. The fact is that, in my youth particularly, it was nothing for me to knock back three or four science fiction novels and anthologies a week--in addition to many tomes of much "weightier" stuff. It's not that I had no discernment or taste, but my appetite for it was prodigious, and all I cared about was the pleasure, the thrill of transportment, that it gave me. Seldom did I inquire or care about who had written my favorite tales, and I had no interest in such minor matters as publishing history or criticism--all I wanted, and what I got, was one captivating, (and ¿Did I say?) transporting story after another. In this, I fear I must acknowledge, that my taste for the raw product itself, with none of the wearisome frippery of "literature," was not unlike the ravenous consumption of "romance novels" by the Sex. Nonetheless, after repeated exposure, certain names lingered from my promiscuous omnivorousness: Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, Alfred Bester, Frederic Pohl, Poul Anderson, Theodore Sturgeon--and today's winner, Robert Silverberg.

For some damned reason, during a recent raid on the ever-lovely Hawaii State Library, I checked out an Anthology of Horror Stories--not my usual fare, to say the least. I found the first several stories, by widely esteemed authors that I actually have never much liked (H.P. Lovecraft, Daphne du Maurier and Jean Ray), frankly bad and boring, and I was about to give it up, when I noticed that Robert Silverberg was the author of the next story--a name which rang distant bells--and so I went on to read 'Passengers.' And I'm so glad I did. I want everyone to read 'Passengers.'