JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

So I like books. In many cases I like them more than people. Anyone who says that no book is more exciting than a human being obviously hasn’t read enough books. Nothing personal but if I had to choose between a mere acquaintance and, say, The Radetzky March or Kaputt, there is no contest.

Whenever I spot a bookstore sale I have to make sure that no good book is languishing in the bargain bin. I might not read all the books I rescue, but I can pass them on to friends.

Found these last Friday, all 80 percent off at Fully Booked in Rockwell.

Read Kubrick when I got home. The author Michael Herr is the man who wrote Dispatches, the classic account of the Vietnam war. He was a longtime friend and collaborator of Kubrick’s, and one of the reasons he wrote this short but substantial memoir is to rebut all the canards (What did the duck ever do to deserve this?) and disrespectful “tributes” following the director’s death in 1999. Herr is particularly angry about the scornful reviews of Kubrick’s last film Eyes Wide Shut—the critics just didn’t get it. “There aren’t many spectacles more dispiriting than this one: the culture-critical smart set, united in aversion, dreadfully putting on their thinking caps.”

I know I saw the film, enjoyed it (I even remember the day I saw it because I cut class and jumped on the train from New Haven to New York and it was the rare occasion that I did not get lost) and wrote about it in my column, but what did I say? To my relief it was an enthusiastic review, even said something nice about Tom Cruise. (Double relief because my friend Ricky has excommunicated people based on their reception of Eyes Wide Shut.)

In the book Herr recalls how Kubrick would give him books. “When he sent you a book, he wanted you to read it, and not just read it, but to drop everything and get into it.” Every couple of weeks Kubrick would call to ask if he’d read it yet. Kubrick spent hours on the phone; Gustav Hasford whose book The Short-Timers became the basis for Full Metal Jacket claims he once had a 7-hour telephone conversation with the director.

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Every time I see a James Salter book in a bargain bin I have to buy it. If you see A Sport And A Pastime or any of his books at a Book Sale or a bargain bin, could you get it for me? Alert me in Comments and we’ll arrange a swap.

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Twittering Heights in Emotional Weather Report (Gadgets edition) in the Star.