I was never a big Bill Clinton fan — so much ability squandered on just keeping himself afloat, no willingness to take a tough stand on principle alone. But he did have his charms. Here’s Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez, describing a dinner with William Styron, Carlos Fuentes, and Clinton:
When we asked him what he was reading, he sighed and mentioned a book on the economic wars of the future, author and title unknown to me.
“Better to read ‘Don Quixote,’” I said to him. “Everything’s in there.” Now, the ‘Quixote’ is a book that is not read nearly as much as is claimed, although very few will admit to not having read it. With two or three quotes, Clinton showed that he knew it very well indeed. Responding, he asked us what our favorite books were. Styron said his was “Huckleberry Finn.”
I would have said “Oedipus Rex,” which has been my bed table book for the last 20 years, but I named “The Count of Monte Cristo,” mainly for reasons of technique, which I had some trouble explaining.
Clinton said his was the “Meditations of Marcus Aurelius,” and Carlos Fuentes stuck loyally to “Absalom, Absalom,” Faulkner’s stellar novel, no question, although others would choose “Light in August” for purely personal reasons. Clinton, in homage to Faulkner, got to his feet and, pacing around the table, recited from memory Benji’s monologue, the most thrilling passage, and perhaps the most hermetic, from “The Sound and the Fury.”
The resemblance to GW Bush is uncanny! He’s an avid reader too. Really!
December 28th, 2005 at 1:08 pm
I once wrote President Clinton about the books that most influenced his growing up and as president. He wrote back and included a list of 21 books that he felt really had an impact on him. They included:
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker
Lincoln by David Donald
One Hundred Years of Solitude by G.G. Marquez
Politics as a Vocation by Max Weber
The Evolution of Civilizations by Carroll Quigley
plus 14 others. It was a diverse list.
December 28th, 2005 at 1:24 pm
“Benji’s monologue” being the entire first section of the book? Huh?
(Perhaps there is some short passage to which this phrase might refer — it’s been a long time since I read the book — but this just doesn’t have the ring of truth.)
December 28th, 2005 at 3:03 pm
Why do I suspect that the books Marquez et al were discussing weren’t the large print, abridged, golden reader Cliff note versions like those of the books that are being read to Bush??
December 28th, 2005 at 5:30 pm
You may not have seen this yet (from rec.humor.funny):
GEORGE W. BUSH PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY DESTROYED BY FLOOD
Crawford, Texas (AP)
A tragic flood this morning destroyed the personal library of President George W. Bush. The flood began in the presidential bathroom where the books were kept. Both books have been lost. A presidential spokesman said the president was devastated, as he had almost finished coloring the second one. The White House tried to call FEMA but there was no answer.
December 28th, 2005 at 6:39 pm
Cameron, I’d love to know the other 14 books on his list.
Jennifer
December 28th, 2005 at 6:51 pm
Jennifer, here they are:
-I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
-Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-1963 by Taylor Branch
-Living History by Hillary Clinton
-The Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot
-Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
-The Way of the World: From the Dawn of Civilzations to the Eve of the 21st Century by David Fromkin
-The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles’s Philoctetes by Seamus Heaney
-King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Herois in Colonial Africa by Adam Hochschild
-The Imitation of Christ by Thomas Kempis
-Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics by Reinhold Niebuhr
-Home to Catalonia by George Orwell
-The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
-You Can’t Go Home Again by Thomas Wolfe
-Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny by Robert Wright
-The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats by W.B. Yeats
December 28th, 2005 at 7:08 pm
The best thing about being president is that you get invited to William Styron’s house for dinner with Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Carlos Fuentes.
So, which of Clinton’s list of books doesn’t quite belong? I mean, I know you have to be polite to your wife, but still…
December 29th, 2005 at 11:02 am
[...] Via Cosmic Variance, I got a link to this essay by Gabriel Garcia Marquez about Clinton’s reading habits from Salon. [...]
December 29th, 2005 at 5:51 pm
Thanks Cameron….very interesting list. I love the Seamus Heaney piece but I’m surprised it is there…Clinton is an interesting person to analyze, much good and bad, but I heard him give an interview once and he is sharp as a tack, it was a pleasure listening to him.