I don’t include much trivia on the lives of authors reviewed on this site for one reason: I don’t remember much of it.
For those of you who are interested, though, I remember that Charles Van Doren was the guy involved in the TV game-show scandal portrayed in the film Quiz Show.
And then he went on to co-author a very good book with Mortimer Alder: How to Read a Book.
If there’s a prize for least-sexy titles, this has got to be a top contender. But read the title as though the authors were aware of its lack of sales appeal, and wanted to get a chuckle at the expense of the marketing department, and you’ll have a sense for the type of dry humor and dead-on insight you’ll find in the book.
I wish I followed its advice more thoroughly—especially with authors like Denis Johnson and Larry Brown, whom I know I read too quickly—but my failure only proves Alder and Van Doren’s success: they know how to describe the work it takes to appreciate the great ones.
There is no book I would recommend more highly for language teachers.
