We asked Ronald Rosbottom, Winifred L. Arms Professor in the Arts and Humanities and professor of French and European studies, what he’s been reading lately. Here’s what he told us:

I read constantly: to teach, to do research, to relax (no zoned-out running for me). I can’t imagine living without a book close to hand. I figure that I read about 150 separate titles a year, not to mention perusing journals, newspapers and magazines.

I’ve broken two major habits during my lifetime of reading. First, I used to think that one should always finish a book before starting another. That was no fun. Second, I was almost fanatic about reading a book, once begun, to the end, no matter how boring or mediocre or long it was. I’ve happily liberated myself from both of these witless obsessions. So, that’s why I have about a dozen books on my bedside table at any given time. Here are the ones there now, in the order they are stacked.

Hans Fallada, Seul dans Berlin (1965): A novel about an apartment house and its denizens in Berlin during the Nazi regime that reveals a much more complex and brave German society than history has given us. It combines two of my interests: the city and World War II.

Darian Leader, Why Do Women Write More Letters Than They Post? (1996): Leader is a psychoanalyst who knows how to write, and I picked up this book because of a course I’m teaching on 18th-century epistolary fiction. He analyzes how distantly our conceptions of gender have separated us from one another.

Mark Kurlansky, Salt: A World History (2002): I am a sucker for global histories
of common things. If you thought you knew how “the only rock we eat” has affected your history and life, you’re probably mistaken.

Nella Bielski, The Year is ’42 (2004): Another novel, a short one, about how an SS officer, stationed in Paris and then on the Eastern Front, changes his ethics. It’s dense, moving and filled with historical detail.

Thomas Frank, What’s the Matter with Kansas?: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America (2004). I’m not sure they have.

Georges Simenon, La Tête d’un homme (1931): Inspector Maigret is always a canny guide to a Paris we rarely see.

Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping (1980): A beautiful tale about an American family. Friends have been recommending this title to me for years.

Ruth Reichl, Remembrance of Things Paris: Sixty Years of Writing from “Gourmet” (2004): Food, Paris, Paris and food—not to mention very good writing—compel me to turn here when the dour Amherst winter has me dreaming of grabbing a weekend flight to the City of Light.

Edward P. Jones, The Known World (2003): A startling story about the complexities of American slavery, told in a compelling and beautiful prose.

Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey (1798-99): I’m reading this for a class. It’s the only Austen that, for some reason, I’ve never read, and it’s a hoot.

So, there’s my groaning bedside table, my transient library. My wife is always asking me to “clean it up,” or “make it neater,” but I can’t, for it reflects my mind, my impatience to know what I don’t—and don’t even know that I don’t—and my love of prose written with close attention and passion.

Amherst