Feb 23, 2009 Posted by booktiger on Feb 23, 2009 in Britain, Comedy, Royalty | 0 comments

The Uncommon Reader – Alan Bennett

This is a truly delightful, quintessentially British little book. It’s small size belies how fabulous it is. It is one of those little books which you should want to go back and read again and again. For anyone who loves books and knows, but can’t quite express, why they love reading so much, The Uncommon Reader should be a required text.

The Queen, out chasing her Corgis one day, stumbles across the mobile library van which has pulled up outside the kitchens of the Palace. Her Majesty, wandering in, feels that it would be rude not to at least borrow a book and, to the surprise of the young man from the kitchens as well as the librarian himself, she proceeds to wander along the shelves looking for a volume (just to save face of course). As the Queen is obviously far too busy to read, she decides she will take the book and then return it the following week and no harm will be done at all.

What the Queen doesn’t realise is that she might actually open the book and start reading. And in doing so, she might actually enjoy what she reads. And thus begins the Queen’s obsession with books and reading which drives everyone around her mad, but which serves to open her mind up to worlds, people, emotions and events she has never before imagined existed.

What follows is the story of how the Queen manages to sneak books into the royal carriage, or hide them for her journeys. She starts to become fractious if she doesn’t have a book to read (any book addict will know that feeling) and her list of books to read grows rapidly (the ubiquitous ‘to-be-read’ pile which for most of us would require something like 157 years of constant reading to get to the bottom of). Soon, her courtiers and helpers are tearing their hair out. The Queen, in her new found passion, is starting to lose her predictability. Indeed, she has even stopped being so particular. Heaven forbid, she wore the same pair of earrings for two days running!

As a fellow reader, you find yourself cheering for the Queen and booing all of the people around her who are trying to prevent her from burying her nose in a book. I laughed out loud on several occasions thanks to the wonderful absurdity of the dialogue and imagery, and I found myself nodding in agreement on many occasions as the Queen muses over why books are so important, and why the thought of reading sent a shiver down her spine.

I won’t spoil the end, but it is done with the usual Alan Bennett aplomb. The one question I had about this book was simply wondering whether The Queen had read it or not. I am sure if she had, she too would have smiled. You can’t help it.

Rating: 9/10
ISBN: 978-1-84668-049-6
Publisher: Faber and Faber
Year: 2007
Date Finished: 7 January 2008
Pages: 124