Divorare un libro

TROVO AFFASCINANTE LA maniera con la quale a seconda dei contesti e dei periodi storici cambia il significato delle cose ma al tempo stesso le parole rimangono “attaccate”.

“Divorare un libro”: un segno di superficialità? La riflessione, per quanto come sempre anglocentrica, è intrigante perché l’autrice, Louise Adams, scava a fondo e trova nessi e connessioni non banali.

 Money quote: “Novels particularly were associated with such habits of consumption, for they became a symbol of the newly accessible literary market. Commentators described them as feeding unwholesome appetites. In turn, certain readers were linked to novel-imbibing habits, particularly women. Describing their reading as consumption was a way of denigrating them, for it positioned them as vulnerable, ignorant and morally contagious. Gustatory metaphors often implied that women read according to the flesh, in contrast to the disembodied realm of ‘rational’ masculinity.”