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The books that furnish rooms.
Published: 7/30/2012 5:29 PM
Last Modified: 7/30/2012 5:29 PM

Anthony Powell titled one of the novels in his “A Dance to the Music of Time” series “Books Do Furnish a Room.”

It’s only been in the past few days that I realized the books that most people who decorate displays at local furniture stores feel best furnish a room are Readers’ Digest Condensed Books.

We’re in the process of moving our place of residence, and as the home my wife and I have occupied was originally furnished in a style best described as “quiet desperation,” my wife has determined that we need new furniture.

A lot of new furniture.

This is all fine and good. Our current abode is one that real estate agents like to “cozy” or “snug” – which means if we want to have more than one person to visit at a time, the closeness of the quarters might seriously jeopardize marriage vows.

So we have been spending a good portion of our waking hours on weekends wandering through furniture stores in pursuit of the perfect chair, the proper sofa, the acceptable table, the adequate lamp, the “oh this will do for now” pillow.

Being the bookish sort that I am, I’m always fascinated by the volumes that decorators set out to lend an air of – what, sophistication? Elegance? Intellectualism? – well, of something to a wall unit or a coffee table.

I figure that the books put on display in furniture stores were either bought cheaply or donated, which is probably the best explanation why even the more upscale furniture stores – from which, I would like to stress, we did NOT buy anything – will have battered volumes of the Readers’ Digest Condensed Books adorning pieces of wood and fabric costing thousands of dollars.

It almost make you think that these volumes are the literary equivalent of cockroaches – once the mushroom clouds dissipate, the only things left on Earth will be cockroaches and Readers’ Digest Condensed Books.

I should say that I personally have nothing against Readers’ Digest Condensed Books. When I was growing up, these stout, sturdy tomes that arrived by mail every three months were my introduction to the world of literature.

Not simply the books themselves, but the authors. It got to the point that, once my mother surrendered that quarter’s edition, I would page through it to find the page-long author interview at the end of each selection, and would decide which of the three to six titles to read based on how interesting the author seemed to be.

Some authors, I know, abhorred the whole idea of someone hacking out portions of their work to create some bowdlerized shadow of their original vision.

For some other authors, the qualms they might have about the “condensation” process was mitigated by the fact that Readers’ Digest would pay the author about as much as….well, about as much as most people’s annual salary for the privilege of whittling down a given book.

My family subscribed to the program for a couple of decades – from the early 1960s up to 1980 (the program ended in 1997). Probably the most used volume of the bunch was the Summer 1967 one, which contained a novel called “The Least One” by Borden Deal that my family decided one day to read aloud to each other.

I remember that my mother always seemed to end up with the passages that contained the few mild curse words that the Readers’ Digest condensers allowed into print. “Blankety-blank,” Mother would say when confronted with these words. “Oh, blankety-blank.”

What books furnish a room with – especially books that you’ve read and loved for whatever reason – are memories. Memories of the stories told, the characters met, the time and place you were when you first read those words.

As my wife and I wandered through all these furniture stores, I would always check to see if the Readers’ Digest Condensed Books on display were volumes my parents had owned. I’d point them out to my wife and say, “Read that one.”

She may think I’m showing off. But all I’m doing is introducing her some old friends of the family.





Reader Comments 1 Total
16933 (7 months ago)
I enjoyed immensely the Reader's Digest article. I can remember reading from these books at my aunt's house when I was about 12 or 13 (I'm 77 now).
When I was in the working world I subscribed to the condensed versions as I didn't have to worry about deadlines at the library and I could fold down the corners, etc. without worrying about reprimands. Even after retiring about 20 years ago I continued to subscribe but with more free time I also hit the library for current books. I finally stopped my subscription when I realized that I had already read the stories from library books and also my shelves were overflowing. Consequently every charitable organization that called enjoyed the books as I passed them on - one large grocery sack full at a time.

Still reading 5 or 6 books a week - large print when available. I just hope that people will always enjoy printed material of every type.
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ARTS

James D. Watts Jr. has lived in Oklahoma for most his life, even though he still has people saying to him, "Don't sound like you're from around these parts." A University of Oklahoma Phi Beta Kappa graduate, Watts has received the Governor Arts Award, Harwelden Award and the National Conference of Christians and Jews Beth Macklin Award for his writing. Before coming to the Tulsa World, Watts worked for the Tulsa Tribune.

Contact him at (918) 581-8478.

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