Novel Eye

Part of my tension, I think, is the fact that I have not been reading much. As I mentioned--I'm deep in the doldrums (to steal a metaphor) of Moby Dick and a stubbornness on my part keeps me from simply putting it down and picking up something else. Normally I'll read two novels a week. Back in the late spring I did put down MD long enough to read On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan because it was very short. At the time it had not come out in America, but it has by now, and everyone and their brother has reviewed it. I was trying to remember if I found McEwan on my own, or if i found him in college. I know that I read Black Dogs in a class which was called "European Literature after the war," but the Professor admitted was really just a list of April Bernard's favorite authors. We read Calvino , Kundera , Highsmith and Muriel Spark. And Ian McEwan . I've always liked McEwan , but I believe he's becoming a better author as he goes along and I was trying to...