A Tale Of Two or Three Childhoods

Dad didn’t read. Oh, he could read. Well enough, at least, when need be. And he subscribed to the local newspaper and liked to look over the sports section in the morning with his coffee. There were ten or twelve books in the house, mostly tucked away in a bookcase in the corner and, like the other bric-a-brac my mother regularly dusted every week, they were there only for display. They were, as I vaguely recall, Readers Digest condensed versions of then popular novels; but I never saw either of my parents open any of them or, for that matter, not counting the Bible my mother read from once in a great while, saw them read any book at all.

I take that back. Mother read frequently. To me. Children’s books, of course, though not what anyone would call children’s literature. Mostly, they were Little Golden Books, thin cardboard bound illustrated books sold at grocery stores for twenty-five cents apiece, the titles ranging from fairy tales to Disney stories. She read them to me every night until, by an early age, I had memorized the texts and somehow thereby taught myself to read. I entered first grade reading at the third grade level. By third grade I was reading at a high school level. Reading came easy to me, but there were still few books at home by the time I left for college.

But this isn’t about what a bright fellow I am, let alone how different my subsequent relationship with books has been from that of my parents. My mother managed to complete only elementary school and my father dropped out permanently from fourth grade, but those were different times and different circumstances. No, what this is about, at least in part, is my memory of my father extolling the one novel he remembered ever having read, Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities.

“Now that was some story!” I remember him saying on more than one occasion. I never did discover, probably never even thought to ask, why he read it or when, perhaps as a child, himself.

Truth to tell, I’m not a great Dickens fan, nor would I recommend that particular novel to anyone who hadn’t read him before. I have a good friend whose admiration for Dickens is probably exceeded only by her admiration for Jane Austen and who occasionally teaches classes in both at Georgetown, and we have discussed Dickens’ merits and weaknesses on any number of occasions, my view being that the latter outweigh the former. He does adapt wonderfully, however, especially in a mini-series, a number of which the BBC has produced brilliantly. Anyway, this really isn’t about Dickens, either.

Except that today my younger son, age twelve, began reading A Tale of Two Cities today. He also reads well above grade level, but his attitude toward novels, like his attitude toward any object not requiring electricity and including a viewing screen (and, preferably, a game controller), is not especially keen. But the book is a reading assignment from school -- usually, at least in my remembered school experience, the kiss of death. Still, I found a copy from our library and he took it up, grudgingly, and opened it. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of....” Well, you know.

An hour or so passed and he had made his way to Chapter Four. That was this afternoon. It is nearly ten o’clock now and he is reading more or, more precisely, having more read to him by his mother. By request.

Perhaps someday I’ll tell him how his newfound enthusiasm for A Tale of Two Cities this day oddly mirrored his grandfather’s so many, many years ago. Maybe not, though. The parallel, such as it is, is no more than a bridge from my own now often hazy memories of childhood to the present delight of watching a son of mine fall in love with a book. But his grandparents would be delighted, too.