My Literary Pedigree

I read The Atlantic pretty religiously each month (in other words, mostly on the toilet) and it always leaves me feeling both edified and inadequate. It's the book reviews. The depth of knowledge required to write -- let alone read -- a book review for The Atlantic is unnerving, even frightening.

This month, Christopher Hitchens takes on the novel A Hero of Our Time, by Mikhail Lermentov.

Who?

In his review of this newly translated book, Hitchens expresses a passing -- even deep -- knowledge of early-to-mid 19th Centrury Russian literature and culture, and strong enough familiarity with the author to write as if many Atlantic readers may well have picked up on Lermontov, who died in the 1840s. Maybe he's right. And should I now feel shame for choosing (and mostly ignoring) "Irish Lit" over "19th Century Russian Lit" back in college?

Now, Hitchens is a confirmed, and possibly reformed, leftist. So his Russophilia can be excused... but the man -- and most of his fellow Atlantic writers -- are a damn sight better read than I am. I'm learning to accept that. Frankly, I spent most of my high school years studying Marvel Comics circa 1977-1984 and -- through college -- Classic Science Fiction of the 1940s-1980s (Asimov, Heinlein and Pohl).

And perhaps if it came to that, I could write rings around Hitchens and his ilk if there were a call to review Heinlein's Job: A Comedy of Justice , the Dark Phoenix Saga or "Herbie the Robot".

You have to have something to hang your hat on... You can run from it, or you can embrace it... But...but... is there any money in it?