Summer Reading, on the beach and elsewhere

I've been on a biography kick lately, having read so far this summer biographies of Thelonious Monk (by Robin Kelley), Grace Hopper (by Kurt Beyer), and Muriel Spark (by Martin Stannard). And just as Kelley's big biography of Monk sent me back to his music, Stannard's lengthy biography of Spark has made me want to go back and re-read her novels. So as I gather up my gear for a brief outing to the shore, I'm including some Muriel Spark, as well as the Stannard biography.

I've also decided to load up the iPad with some other books I might want to look at. This will be the first time we've had the iPad at the beach, so we'll see how that works. I don't see us actually taking it out on the sand, but maybe that would be the real test! Still, it's a good way to bring along a bunch of alternate reading matter, as well as a connection to the web and all the stuff we're trying to get away from!

On the last few beach outings, my reading has been rather heavy going by most folks' standards. I read most of Louis Menand's The Metaphysical Club at the beach a few years ago, and last year I took along Edmund Wilson's The Fifties. Actually, both of those books were good beach reading for me, since they're filled with fascinating stories about some well known "intellectuals."

I guess I find intellectuals interesting because they have all of the usual human needs and failings, plus substantial additional baggage and insecurities related to their various notions of the significance of their own "work" and its perceived importance in the greater scheme of things. It's all very agonistic and competitive. There seem to be very few life-long friendships among the scribbling classes, but quite a number of life-long rivalries and antagonisms. If that's not good beach reading, then what is?