A dirty little secret...

We have just gotten a book that should be required reading in any library school: How to Talk About Books You Haven't Read by Pierre Bayard. The title is really much more flippant than the actual book (which, true to form, I have skimmed but not actually read). Bayard, who is a professor of French Literature and a psychoanalyst in Paris, takes a philosophical view of the situation - and it's French philosophy, at that. He makes the point that some works are so much a part of the collective consciousness that you don't actually have to read them line by line to know and understand what they are about, Hamlet being an obvious example of this. He also explains that you shouldn't feel ashamed about not having read a particular book. Since every minute you spend reading one book means a minute spent not reading another one, it is almost a moral obligation not to make such exclusionary decisions. He helpfully demonstrates the ways to handle various situations in which you might be expected to comment on a book you haven't read: at a party, in class, even meeting the actual author. He illustrates each of his chapters with excerpts from famous authors and critics who seemingly agree with his philosophy: Oscar Wilde, Umberto Eco, Balzac, Montaigne, even Bill Murray (yes, the SNL guy). You can read as much or as little irony into his writing as you would like - heck, you don't even have to read the book at all! What a liberating philosophy this is....