Toddled Dredge

I have a special place in my heart for Anne Fadiman’s essays. Several years ago my husband bought me her first collection Ex Libris, and spent my birthday reading “Marrying Libraries” aloud to me under a rose arbor in a favorite park.

When I saw her new book at the library, I had to read it. Unlike her first collection of essays, this book does not have one theme throughout. Instead, she meanders through varied interests, and whether she is discussing biographies of Charles Lamb or flavors of ice cream, she engages, amuses and informs. Fadiman’s essay voice is so much like BubandPie’s blogging voice that I sometimes find myself uncertain, as I muse over a remembered quote, which of the two wrote it (and I mean that as a compliment to them both).

Fadiman’s book concludes with an essay describing her memory of seeing a boy drown when she was a teen. The essay does not fit with the rest of the book, or rather, it changes the rest of the book. Instead of a pleasant diversion, her book of essays acquires a darker edge, ending with a kind of mea culpa for the detached observant nature that writes and makes connections between seemingly unconnected things.

I am uncertain why the final essay was included, and I frankly wished it had not been. Whether it was an extra bit included because there was no other place to put it, or it was a necessary catharsis for the author’s memory and emotions, or was included for more deliberate reasons, I think it was a mistake. The book generally maintains the tone of conversation between familiar friends, and the final essay ends the conversation on an abruptly tragic note. It would have been better developed into a separate book, or as a larger essay earlier and more integrated with the rest.