In Praise of Re-Reading

I know some people question the value of re-reading books one has read several times before, and their argument that there are so many important books still unread is sound.  When I was very young, sometime in the reign of Ethelred the Unready, to paraphrase John McPhee, I felt I should read every book in the library.  I later realized this was both impractical and unwise; not that it hurts to read really bad writing, as that helps one to develop discrimination (said he, pedantically). 

But re-reading a book has the same value as listening again to a piece of music, or watching a film one has seen before, or re-examining a painting.  There is, if the work has depth and complexity, always something more to find.

Recently I have been re-reading the novels of John P. Marquand, most of which, I suspect, are out of print, although he was a popular author in his time, and several of his novels ("H.M. Pulham, Esquire," "The Late George Apley," "B.F.'s Daughter," "Melville Goodwin, USA," plus his series of Mr. Moto thrillers) became successful films.

Marquand wrote comedies of manners, gentle satires, mixed with an elegiac affection for times past.  My personal favorites are "Point of No Return" (which ran for hundreds of performances as a Broadway play with Henry Fonda), the under-rated "Sincerely, Willis Wayde," and his very funny golf club yarn, "Life at Happy Knoll." 

Most are long, leisurely books, comforting to the reader.  They remind me of the Trollope novels Jack Burden reads to the emotionally traumatized Anne Stanton at the end of Robert Penn Warren's "All the King's Men" as a kind of literary chicken soup. 

So I suppose I will go on re-reading the books that mean much to me, while working my way through whatever is current and whatever past that remains unread and necessary.

And always pleased to read your recommendations, to see what undiscovered treasures there may be on your reading list.