dumbfoundry

What, specifically, attracted you to Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway?

Michael Cunningham: Mrs. Dalloway is the first great book I ever read. I read it in high school. I went to school in southern California at a not very rigorous public school where I was a not very dedicated student. I was sort of a skateboard kid and really more interested in smoking than I was reading. And a girl I liked kind of threw a copy of Mrs. Dalloway at me and said why don't you read this and try to be less stupid. I kind of liked the stupid that I was, but I read it for her sake and—on one hand—didn't understand it all all. But on the other hand, could see the density and beauty and complexity of those sentences. I have never seen written language like that before. I didn't know you could do that. I remember thinking, oh, she was doing with language something like what Hendrix does with a guitar. It was the book that made me a reader. I suspect that most of us had a first book, kind of like having a first kiss—possibly not a great book, but one that cracks it open for you. Made you understand how much books can mean to you. So, by happenstance it was Mrs. Dalloway.

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