I vividly remember, at age 4, looking over my father’s shoulder as he read the newspaper. I remember that the letters looked to me just like Greek letters looked, before I studied ancient Greek, as strange symbols, like sigmas and deltas for one who has never studied Calculus.
The first "grown-up" book I remember reading was "Cheaper by the Dozen". I was very excited to think that I was mature enough to read a real book. I constantly check the page number, to monitor my progress, and held the book sideways, to savor the 1/3 and half-way and 3/4 mark, and I would calculate how many pages remained until I was finished.
I did enjoy the book and to this day remember some things about it. I remember it being a light-hearted but perfectly serious book. I found the previews to the recent movie version offensive. They want to make it into a farce of clowns, to pander to the general public’s appetite for farce and nonsense.
By the way, the term slap stick comes from the days of silent films. Someone in the theater had a special device of two sticks on a hinge. During fight scenes, they would slap the sticks to create a sound effect of blows and punches.
Prior to that, I remember reading Stuart Little.
I was quite sickly as a child, and missed much of 1st grade. Somewhere between 1st and second grade I was assigned a homebound teacher. I remember her taking me into a spare room, where it was quiet, and teaching me how to read my first words, from a "Dick and Jane" reader. I was so proud that I ran out of the room to show my mother that I could now read.
In third grade, I remember reading "Wind in the Willows" and being wounded by its poignancy, but now at age 57 I remember little else that that sentimental feeling.
One sleepy summer between 5th and 6th grade, I went into a Drug Store and purchased a science fiction book for 35 cents entitled "Out of a Silent Planet" by C.S. Lewis. I new nothing about church or religion or C.S. Lewis. But, as I read the exciting story, I began to realize that something subtle and marvelous was being hinted at regarding God. I thought that this Lewis fellow must be quite clever and on to something important.
That same Summer, from the same drugstore, I purchased a paperback about a vampire. I was fascinated by monsters and vampires. The novel was not pornographic, but in one scene, the vampire has a woman who has passed out, and she is totally naked, and her breasts are described in some detail. This erotic passage was the highpoint of the book for me. I knew there and then that I wanted to become a vampire and spend my days peeking and unconscious naked women. I was an only child living in a neighborhood of all boys, so I had little experience with female anatomy aside from a few National Geographic photos. I raced to the public library and checked out Braham Stoker’s novel, Dracula. I was certain that there would be even better descriptions of all this nudity business. I reclined drowsily in the hammock under a tree, and read chapter after chapter of LETTERS! CORREPSONDENCE! When oh when would the good stuff ever come?! I read through half the book, and gave up.
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