What are you reading this week of December 20, 2015?

[pscot]

9. One fiction, one biography

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and his years of pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami and Young Orson, a bio of Orson Welles by Patrick McGilligan. Welles was a prodigy. He flamed early, burned hot and then subsided, like a dormant volcano. Some artists don't hit their stride 'til they're 40, but At 40 Orson Welles was done. This is presented as some kind of tragedy. I'm not sure why. Nobody ever wonders why Mt. St. Helens hasn't done anything lately. What it did was plenty. Like St. Helens, Orson stood the world on its ear for a while and left it changed; fascinating guy and an entertaining biography. It's too long, but there seems to be a rule now days that serious biographies have to weigh at least four pounds and begin with the subject's Elizabethan ancestors.