Art Garfunkel, Reading Wonder

The New Yorker this week is very good—I thought all three poetry selections were strong (particularly Les Murray's), and the Adam Gopnik piece on Sarkozy and Carla Bruni was incisive and highly enjoyable.

But what was perhaps most amusing was a Talk of the Town piece on Art Garfunkel and his habit (devotional activity?) of recording the titles of all the books he reads. This reading log is a part of the official Art Garfunkel website (although I discovered it is a little bit hidden, at least from the front page—to save you the trouble, the page is here). Garfunkel began the list in June 1968, and has kept it (apparently) faithfully ever since, amassing 1023 books. It's a qualitatively impressive list, but it has some fun quirks too—most of which seem to have been covered in the New Yorker article. But explore for yourselves!