Did you read it yet?

If not, go back and read it and then we’ll start.

That essay is really about reading classics in adulthood, once one has finished with one’s schooling. The joys of a life lived with them and the pleasures of rediscovery.

For me, The Count of Monte Cristo is one that I go back to. In high school, I read it over and over again. In the days before Barnes and Noble and online ordering, it was harder to find what one was looking. I had read The Three Musketeers and loved and now was looking for a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo but all I could find in the mall bookstores were abridged editions. So I went I spoke to a manager and we found in their system what we hoped was an unabridged copy.

When it arrived, it was a great big hardback thing covered in fine blue fabric.

I read it over and over again through high school. Then I put it down for a while. Then I picked it up again.

I hadn’t noticed before that Edmond Dantès has his internal thoughts described only until he becomes the Count of Monte Cristo. We know it is him, but his thoughts and plans are inscrutable to us except from the outside, from what others view. Such a small thing, but brilliant. Even though no reader can unaware who the count is, Dumas still manages to put us in the same situation as those who do not know.

On a final note, that essay was written by the Cuban born, Italian writer, Italo Calvino. Read Invisible Cities. Amazing book.