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Earth, moon and stars
Three photography books focus on the amazing spectacle of the planet we live on and the skies beyond.
By Andrew Long
[11/12/99]

Reaching to the converted
Oprah's Book Club introduces readers to people they already know -- themselves.
By Gavin McNett
[11/12/99]

Ivory Tower
Body paranoia
Ghostly heart attacks, cancers and other assorted ills have plagued me for the last 31 years. Could the cause be my beloved job?
By David Alford
[11/12/99]

Reviews
"Nat King Cole" by Daniel Mark Epstein
A top-notch biography celebrates the jazz piano genius who gained his greatest fame as a pop singer.
By Greg Villepique
[11/12/99]

Buy low, sell high, sez Bard
In the latest cash-in-on-the-Bard book, the tragic heroes of Shakespeare are just losers who failed at crisis management.
By Ron Rosenbaum
[11/11/99]

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By Mary Elizabeth Williams

Nov. 12, 1999 | I don't need Oprah Winfrey to tell me what to read. I'm a literate, library-card-carrying adult who has spent a lifetime developing a sharp sense of personal preference. But I'm not so arrogant as to believe that something that's of no particular use to me is of no particular use, period. Quite the contrary.

Although I've never shopped for novels that bear the Oprah imprimatur, I don't particularly care if my local book shop is out of "Mother of Pearl," and I couldn't pick Bernhard Schlink out of a lineup, I think Ms. Winfrey's book club kicks ass. I may not get my reading list from it, but I've nevertheless learned something from its success -- what an astonishing difference one person can make, and what elitist twits people who pride themselves on their erudition can be.

Also Today Reaching to the converted Oprah's Book Club introduces readers to people they already know -- themselves. By Gavin McNett

It's been such a long time for some of us that it's easy to forget how it felt when reading initially enthralled us, when it clicked in our minds that books were a portal to realms that stretched far beyond the reach of parents and school and the old neighborhood. Whether that moment came by way of Tom Sawyer or Jo March or Nancy Drew, we became alive to the power of words and imagination, and nothing would ever be the same again.

We're the lucky ones, and we're a distinct minority. Despite the proliferation of superstores and the reading groups that have sprung up like Starbucks in the last few years, we are still not an especially book-loving nation. Approximately 40 million American adults can barely read or write. Libraries are languishing. And the guy next to you on the subway or in the carpool lane probably hasn't picked up a novel since he snoozed his way through "The Scarlet Letter" in 12th grade.

Given how far we still have to come in terms of collective literacy, you'd think that Oprah Winfrey's status as a champion of the written word would be assured, that her recognition at the National Book Awards this year would be a cause for cheering. For three years now, she has been using her fame, her reach and her ratings to promote the noble habit of regular, thoughtful reading. Her on-air book club has catapulted respected authors like Toni Morrison and Kaye Gibbons into blockbuster bestsellerdom. It has launched new writers like Edwidge Danticat and given them a mind-bogglingly huge audience. And it's enthusiastically encouraged millions of viewers to experience, perhaps for the first time in their lives, the thrill of releasing the bookworm within. What's so bad about that?

Oprah's critics see things differently. They're troubled by the dominance she has over the publishing industry -- her monthly selections inevitably set off the kind of buying frenzies that leave blank spaces on bookstore shelves and send publishers into reprint panic. They bemoan the fact that authors of merit struggle to find an audience while Oprah-approved ones gain seemingly effortless public acclaim. Worst of all, they grouse, she turns her viewers into sheep, imposing the tastes of an overpaid TV star on helpless consumers.

Oh, please. As if the rest of us magically decided on our own to pick up Kipling or, later, Sartre. As if we live our lives in a pure and holy bubble free of reference and recommendation. Readers aren't born, they're made -- made when someone takes the time to nurture curiosity and offer helpful suggestions along the way. And a novice bibliophile could do a hell of a lot worse than listening to what Oprah likes: Alice Hoffman, Wally Lamb, Janet Fitch, and the list goes on.

I used to feel pretty ambivalent about Oprah's reading group, until the backlash kicked in. Underneath the hand-wringing about manipulating the bestseller list and mass mind control, there seemed something else at play -- a spiteful irritation that someone who wasn't the editor of a literary review or a fixture on C-Span's "Booknotes" could have such awesome reach as a taste-maker, and that an audience could be pliant enough to trust her. What a narrow, snotty attitude.

Next page | Why Oprah succeeded where others failed