I loathe slogans, but there's one saying I like in general. "The perfect is the enemy of the good."

I spend - as I suspect a good many AWADers spend - a fair amount of time in bookstores and libraries. There are huge sections on technology - rows of seven or eight foot shelves. This is fine by me, except it's harder than heck to find books on computer theory. The selection tends to be quite sparse. I can deal with the fact that a lot of the "science" books are pablum, but there are nearly as many books on spiritualism and religion and philosophy (which is also a lot of religion). There tend to be far more books in this arena than in real science. Plus the horoscopes, romance novels and the like. I'm not complaining. It's just an observation. I understand the bookstore is giving people what they want. They could stock the best books ever written at the cheapest prices and go out of business, as their potential customers would almost certainly go elsewhere.

Against this backdrop, I think Oprah has done well. It's not romance. It's not happy princess. It's not self-help or horoscopes or religion or political blather. If people don't like her recommendations, they are free to suggest alternatives. If the book is mediocre, it is at least not stupid. I would say the same thing had she recommended The Great Gatsby. Being less than perfect does not equate to being evil - at least not to my mind. I don't think we will improve the minds of the public by jumping straight to the Ulysses (even if it is the greatest novel in the English language, which I disbelieve). If you're thirsting in the desert and someone offers you a coke, do you refuse because "I really need pure water?" By any standard, her choice is okay.

I don't understand the relevance of normalcy to the discussion. I have described (above) a portion of what I perceive as the status quo. Oprah (for reasons I do not know) has started a "book club" to highlight and discuss books she has enjoyed. I don't know what books she discussed in her other book club. I don't what other books she has discussed in THIS club. I have not said directly, but indicated indiretly, that this book is a step above what appears the norm to me - getting people to try something they might not otherwise be inclined to try, namely "a classic." There are plenty of books she might have chosen better, but this is not a bad choice. Moby Dick would have been a better choice had she chosen Typee, but maybe she hasn't read Moby Dick or maybe she didn't like it (an understandable reaction).

There are always better choices. Those possibilities don't make her choice bad or wrong.

k