Weekend Read: The Last Post

By Wyatt Mason

No, by The Last Post, I’m not suggesting, over this first weekend of May, that you curl up with Ford Madox Ford’s novel of that name; rather, I mean to say that this particular post will be my last in this space.

One year ago, with the very generous welcome of this old and excellent magazine, I began compiling these notes on reading and writing. The ambition was simple: to take some of the sorts of things I tend to exchange with writer friends via email and place them, regularly, before the public.

My expectations were low: I did not think that my thoughts on such matters would be of any wider interest to any larger group of readers than those dozen with whom I already privately corresponded. And yet, as my electronic mailbag has made clear, a larger group of readers than we’ve lately been told should care about such things did take an interest. I’ve been lucky to engage in a lively correspondence off the page with readers who, as often as they’ve written to take vigorous issue with an idea (or outright error) of mine, have also generously directed me to books I hadn’t heard of much less read (and am now reading).

According to the webmaster, some hundreds of thousands of people (or “unique visitors,” in the creepily Rumsfeldean turn) have read my posts over the year. Yes, in the web-world, where a nipple slip can net you a million sets of eyes in a breathless blink and click, these are Lilliputian numbers. In my world, however, those are towering digits, enormous for what they might say about the reading life: that there is still, in our noisy culture, a quiet but forcible interest in finding good books to read, and in debating what makes books good.

We “unique readers” know this, in our solitary hours. But it is pleasing, at times, to have company in that knowledge, to know that one isn’t alone in one’s enthusiasms. For my part, I have taken great pleasure in the enthusiasm of readers for this space, and am grateful for the time you’ve spent here. For now, know that I’m turning my attention to other tasks, with the expectation, at some point future, of returning to one not unlike this.

With thanks, and wishing you many good things to read,