The Uncommon Reader is none other than HM the Queen who drifts accidentally into reading when her corgis stray into a mobile library parked at Buckingham Palace. She reads widely (JR Ackerley, Jean Genet, Ivy Compton Burnett and the classics) and intelligently. Her reading naturally changes her world view and her relationship with people like the oleaginous prime minister and his repellent advisers. She comes to question the prescribed order of the world and loses patience with much that she has to do. In short, her reading is subversive. The consequence is, of course, surprising, mildly shocking and very funny.
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[AT WINDSOR it was the evening of the state banquet and as the president of France took his place beside Her Majesty, the royal family formed up behind and the procession slowly moved off and through into the Waterloo Chamber]***
(@FaberBooks, 4 September 2004, 124 pages, ebook, borrowed from @GlasgowLib via @OverDriveLibs)
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I've read a few things by Alan Bennett and tend to enjoy his work. I'd heard good things about this book so decided to give it a shot. I really enjoyed this. It's hilarious, very tongue-in-cheek. Bennett pokes fun at The Royal Family but does it in a gentle way. This is also a homage to the important of reading and literature. I thought it was delightful. If anything, I thought it was too short and I would have been happy to stay with the story for much longer.
