And, if you’ve ever received books as a gift, you’ll know what a high-wire act this can be. Book preference is a nuanced, highly specific thing. To return to my dad, he likes the sort of fantasy books that come with illustrated maps at the front. But that isn’t to say he likes all fantasy books that have illustrated maps at the front. One year I tried to buy him exactly this sort of book, and discovered that he only likes a very narrow band of fantasy books with illustrated maps at the front. Stray out of his comfort zone, even by a millimetre, and you may as well have bought him a Mills & Boon for all the good it will do.
Last time I had a first week at university, I successfully shaved a balloon covered in shaving foam without popping it, for which I won shots at the local nightclub, possibly jelly. It is 20 years later, and I am having my first week at university again. This time, I am 41. I am sticking a very strict and detailed timetable to my fridge, making plans for who is going to walk the dog on which days and desperately trying not to say anything that makes me stand out as a late millennial, such as “I used to write all my essays by hand,” and “Wow, literally everything’s online,” both of which came out of my mouth very early on. There are no jelly shots. I am horrified to find that I am constantly on the verge of letting an “in my day…” slip out. I don’t smoke, but I find that in my head, I am always sucking hard on a metaphorical cigarette, hoary with age and experience.
"I love to touch them, I love to feel I am with them when I have those things in my hand. They are also a wonderful social history.
"I love the handwriting, and the fact that I can see what they ate in those times."
The Oneg Shabbat archive was a secret project of Jewish prisoners in the Warsaw Ghetto to record their histories as they awaited deportation to Nazi death camps during World War II. Lauren Grodstein has used this historical fact as the basis for her mesmerizing new novel, “We Must Not Think of Ourselves.”