Collyer’s “One Edition for All Time” reminds me of the Rev. Casaubon’s “the Key to All Mythologies” (in Middlemarch)–another ambitious project impractical in conception and uncompletable in reality.
What other Doctorow have you read? I’ve read “The Book of Daniel” and “The Waterworks” (and seen “Ragtime”).
Waterworks was an interesting “meh.” Although the setting was vivid, I didn’t find the plot interesting, and there are other books, such as Jack Finney’s, that bring 19th-century New York into sharper focus.
Ragtime is very interesting for its use of photographs. He constructs scenes out of famous photos that must have been part of his historical research—Peary at the North Pole, a baseball team posing in front of the Sphinx, etc. The novel explores our fixation with reproducible images. I wonder what Doctorow thought of social media. He luckily died before Trump.
The Untimely Typewriter:Daily Writings Against the Tides of Distraction 
Ooh, very thought provoking.
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I am through only half of the book. I can’t wait to see where Doctorow is taking these ideas.
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Collyer’s “One Edition for All Time” reminds me of the Rev. Casaubon’s “the Key to All Mythologies” (in Middlemarch)–another ambitious project impractical in conception and uncompletable in reality.
What other Doctorow have you read? I’ve read “The Book of Daniel” and “The Waterworks” (and seen “Ragtime”).
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I’ve read Ragtime and Book of Daniel. How was Waterworks?
(Haven’t read GE’s Middlemarch.)
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Waterworks was an interesting “meh.” Although the setting was vivid, I didn’t find the plot interesting, and there are other books, such as Jack Finney’s, that bring 19th-century New York into sharper focus.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ragtime is very interesting for its use of photographs. He constructs scenes out of famous photos that must have been part of his historical research—Peary at the North Pole, a baseball team posing in front of the Sphinx, etc. The novel explores our fixation with reproducible images. I wonder what Doctorow thought of social media. He luckily died before Trump.
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That’s interesting. The movie wisely adapted the theme to its medium and included an important subplot about the birth of motion pictures.
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