A literary travelogue in New York, by Michael Dirda

Instead, I remembered that an old friend from DC now lived in Queens and actually had a spare bedroom.

I usually take the bus to New York but this time I managed to find a reasonably priced ticket on Amtrak. As usual, I procrastinated for an hour on what to read along the way, finally settling on Lawrence Block’s just published”The Burglar Who Met Fredric Brown“, an unexpected but welcome late release for Bernie Rhodenbarr, old bookseller, brilliant first-person narrator and professional thief.

I was only halfway through Block’s novel – at 84, this seductive storyteller has lost none of his flair – when my train pulled into Penn Station. Therefore, I had to break up right after Bernie and his lesbian friend Carolyn stole the Kloppmann diamond from a sleazy billionaire’s Trump Tower-shaped penthouse. What about all the high-tech surveillance cameras, you ask? Block solves this problem with a bold sci-fi twist that you should experience for yourself.

Lawrence Block and PG Wodehouse: How two prolific writers found their voices

Kew Gardens, my friend Eric’s new home, happened to be the neighborhood in Queens where comedian Rodney “I get no respect” Dangerfield grew up, as well as the site of the shocking 1964 rape and murder of Kitty Genovese ( which inspired Harlan Ellison’s Edgar Prize-winning story, “The Whining of the Whipped Dogs”). That 38 bystanders did nothing to prevent or even report this horrific crime is now known to be largely untrue.

After dropping off my wheelie bag at Eric’s apartment, I rode the Long Island Railroad back to “town” for a cocktail party celebrating the Folio Society’s 75th anniversary. Over the years I have written half a dozen introductions to various Folio editions; hence the invitation. While enjoying bite-sized crab cakes, I chatted with, among others, NPR’s Scott Simon, then admired the most recent Folio titles, especially the 75th anniversary edition of Michael Ende”The never-ending story», beautifully illustrated by Marie-Alice Harel.

I also learned that Folio, having done well with deluxe facsimiles of classic Marvel comics, would soon be releasing substantial albums devoted to the DC Comics universe. Additionally, one of its editors would be on a panel at New York Comic Con later in the week. Was I going? No, not this year – a decision I regretted when I spotted a sexy Batgirl and a muscular Conanesque warrior pushing their way through a subway crowd.

Inexplicably, most of Wednesday afternoon seems to have gone by as I lingered in the basement of The Strand, methodically perusing its shelves of literary biographies, essays and reviews. Am I the only one who finds such a relaxing and restorative navigation? Be that as it may, my taste for cultural detours led me to return home, to name just four titles, “The Gilbert and Sullivan Annotated Completeby Ian Bradley; “In the wake of Diaghilevthe second half of dance critic Richard Buckle’s autobiography; “The rare book game», a collection of essays by George Sims; and “Evelyn Waugh: Personal Writings 1903-1921”, a Cambridge Scholarly Edition volume of the novelist’s complete works.

At dawn on Thursday, I went to the New York Public Library for a meeting of the Lapham’s Quarterly Advisory Board. While this journal – each issue of which explores a specific theme or idea in depth – bears the name of founder Lewis Lapham, this eminent journalist opened this first in-person post-pandemic meeting by welcoming its new editor, the historian hit Simon Winchester. Then, for two hours, young LQ staff members along with a dozen writers and scholars – including Ian Buruma and Francine Prose in the library, and David Cannadine and Linda Colley electronically from Princeton — suggested ideas and texts relating to “islands”, both real and metaphorical. Subsequently, curator Carolyn Vega exhibited island treasures from NYPL’s Berg Collectionlike Robert Louis Stevenson’s copy of “Gulliver’s Travels“and a page of evidence from Darwin”About the origin of species», with the marginal corrections of its author.

TS Eliot wrote about waste and unhappiness. His private life provided material.

That afternoon the weather turned sunny and glorious, so naturally I headed to another basement, this time to examine the Argosy Book Store’s literary fiction and non-fiction shelves. I selected half a dozen books, starting with a beautiful American first edition dust jacket of Nancy Mitford’s comic novel, “Love in a cold climate.” I once owned Max Beerbohm’s”seven menwhich contains the spellbinding ‘Enoch Soames’, ‘AV Laider’ and other imaginary portraits, but could not pass up a copy bearing the bookplate of Beerbohm’s famous authority, N. John Hall.

On Friday, I enjoyed a nearly three-hour lunch with children’s literature scholar Michael Patrick Hearn, who a few days earlier had moderated a lively panel titled “Oz from page to step to screenat the Grolier Club. (I watched it online.) Michael and I remembered polymath Martin Gardner and favorite children’s writers and illustrators like James Marshall, Natalie Babbitt, and Leo and Diane Dillon.

In fact, we only stopped talking when it was time for me to head to the Grolier Club to attend its two current exhibitions:Aubrey Beardsley: 150 years young(ending November 12) andBuilding the book from the ancient world to the present day,” subtitled “Five Decades of Rare Book School & the Book Arts Press” (ending December 23). Organized by Barbara Heritage and Ruth-Ellen St. Onge, the RBS exhibit features items used in school lessons, including a page from the Mainz Psalter, all sorts of bookbinding tools, a two-sheet mold of the Wookey Hole paper mill, the lithographic stone that printed the cover image of the novel dime”Davy Crockett’s Boy Hunter” and even an old Rocket eBook.

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The Beardsley exhibition, rich in original drawings, rare posters, holographic letters and more, draws inspiration from the unparalleled collections of Mark SamuelsLasner. In interviews that evening, Lasner recounted some of his adventures as a collector, while his co-curator, Margaret D. Stetz, discussed Beardsley’s life in his relationship somewhat playfully. with the beds. The artist – who died aged 25 of tuberculosis – knew beds primarily as places of illness and rest, but they carry multiple meanings, as well as an erotic charge, in his provocative illustrations.

When I finally got back to DC on Saturday afternoon, my wife pointed out to me that she had rented an electric rake from Home Depot and that if I knew what was good for me, I better pass the Sunday to dethatch dead grass and weeds from the lawn. That’s exactly what I did. Galloping occasionally around New York may be fine, but yard work is forever.

Michael Dirda is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for Book World and the author of the memoir “An open book“, winner of the Edgar Prize”On Conan Doyleand five collections of essays:Readings,” “linked to please,” “pound by pound,” “Classics for fun” and “Navigations.”