Books spotted on TV

In the hands of Leonard on my favorite show, The Big Bang Theory-- A Wrinkle in Time. It helps to know that Leonard is a physicist and was riding a train at the time.

In an episode of Sex and the City, Miranda was picking up a guy at a biography bookstore and rattled off a few including Elizabeth I: The Shrewdness of Virtue by Jasper Ridley.

In a Friends rerun, Joey and Rachel book swap, his is the The Shining and hers Little Women. Joey is so overcome with sadness from reading the girly book, he has to put it in the freezer to escape it, its so funny.

In a rerun of The Big Bang Theory, Raj is reading a copy of New Moon.

On an episode of Two and a Half Men, Walden was reading Ulysses. After 14 years he was only up to page 8. Sounds like me. I never made it past breakfast on Bloomsday.

I saw someone on The Big Bang Theory reading Wrinkles in Time by George Smoot.

Spotted on the kitchen counter of Alton Brown's Good Eats show the Food Lovers Encyclopedia.

On an episode of Big Bang Theory in Sheldon's apartment a copy of Inner Space Outer Space.

A Facebook friend, member of the Aubrey-Maturin Appreciation Society, pointed out that on the television show Parks and Rec, the character Ron Swanson is a fan and can be seen reading Master and Commander.

While watching last Sunday's CBS Sunday morning, they interviewed former prosecutor turned novelist Linda Fairstein. I spotted on her bookshelf, as they toured her writing den, a copy of Nellie Bly: Daredevil, reporter, Feminist by Brooke Kroeger.

On today’s CBS Sunday Morning I spotted a copy of Double Talk on the bookshelf of journalist Seymour M. Hersh. There are multiple books of this title so I’m not sure if I snagged the right one.

Obviously I watch CBS’s Sunday Morning a lot. Today in a brief shot of Walter Isaacson’s Library I spotted on his bookshelf a copy of Dave Eggers’ The Circle.

Seth Meyers, in his attic hideaway, has The Thorn Birds sitting on a side table behind him.

Stephen Colbert had Mayor Pete and Amy Klobuchar on his show last week. Both sat in front of bookcases. I zoomed in to see whether I could read any spines. Lots of biographies. Stephen asked each of them to pull a random book and say something about it. Klobuchar pulled I Feel Bad About My Neck. Mayor Pete said he had just assembled his shelves (IKEA Hemnes, it looked like) and he’d just been reorganizing his books. He pulled Colbert’s I Am America And So Can You!. Stephen reaches back behind to his own shelves and pulled the same book. It was a cute moment.

Jimmy Kimmel has four books stacked on his desk at home.
Momofuku
Mastering Pasta
Bianco
and one I couldn't read.

Seth Meyers has replaced The Thorn Birds with a stack of four other titles; and then a pitcher of flowers on top. Very bad practice! Just asking for an accidental elbow to knock the vase over and drench the books.
Can't read the top two spines, but on the bottom is White Teeth by Zadie Smith and Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi.

TMZ caught Matt Damon on his way to see Ben Affleck while carrying The Big Goodbye.

On Ted Lasso, each footballer gets a book from Ted. Jamie receives The Beautiful and the Damned while Roy Kent receives A Wrinkle in Time. After reading it, Roy realizes he needs to step up as a leader, which was Ted's intent all along.

On the philosophy class episode of Young Sheldon, Sheldon is reading The Logical Structure of the World by Rudolph Carnap and Rene Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy.

On an episode of B+ Positive the retired football player was reading Lee Child’s Jack Reacher.

On this week’s episode of What We Do In the Shadows, Guillermo is reading Sun Tzu’s The Art of War.

In the first episode first season of HBO’s The Flight Attendant a train passenger was reading A Royal Affair. Since there are dozens of books by that title I’m not sure which one it is.

C-Span footage

Representative Katie Porter, during the vote for Speaker of the House, reading The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CnSDjE1K3NK/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

On this week’s episode of Only Murders in the Building Charles Hayden Savage is reading How to Talk to Women. I’m not sure if it’s this particular book or a fake.

Ha! Rewatching the first season of Good Omens on Prime and noticed the American air base guard is reading Neil Gaiman’s American Gods.

I'm seeing ads on SBS tv here for a Christmas album by Aled Jones and Russell Watson. They are photographed with a bookcase as a background. So far, so normal. But among the books, clearly visible, are a couple of volumes of the All England Law Reports. The appearance of those volumes is extremely familiar to an old-skool law student such as myself, but you can almost read the titles on the spines. Neither Jones nor Watson has any connection with law so far as I know.

In season 1 of Resident Alien, Harry the alien is seen reading Hellboy and Dracula.

In season 2 of Resident Alien the accused wife of the murdered doctor is at the town of Patience family day reading Eat, Pray, Love.

I keep noticing these things. Again in season 2 of Resident Alien 👽 the mayor is reading The Guttenberg Bible: A Memoir by Steve Guttenberg. And his wife Kate is reading Our Town.

Paused to see what it was, but in The Flight Attendant, Jada has a copy of epic poem Helen in Egypt by Hilda Doolittle on her bedside table when Cassie calls her in episode 6.
Also, far more obviously, the main protagonist is reading Crime and Punishment on the plane in ep 1.

In an episode of Big Bang Theory, Leonard is reading Wrinkles in Time by George Smoot.

In the seventh season of Danish drama Seaside Hotel (Badehotellet), set in the early years of WW2, the character Edward Weyse reads Havoc by Tom Kristensen.

In season 4 (episode 7) of Parlement, a Belgian/French/German multilingual comedy series about EU politics, two characters - Carmen and Eamon - both read The World of Yesterday by Stefan Zweig in the original German (so Die Welt von Gestern). That inspired me to pick it up, and I am very glad I did.

In Finnish mystery series Sunset Grove, the main character reads Jerusalem by Selma Lagerhöf.

In The Big Bang Episode called the 21 Second Excitation, Leonard is reading Eat, Pray, Love while waiting in line for an Indiana Jones movie.

In Star Trek: Picard season 1, Picard's home library includes The Complete Robot by Isaac Asimov (which he describes as a classic). Captain Rios reads Tragic Sense of Life by Miguel de Unamuno.

Symptoms Illness & Surgery is consulted by Victor Meldrew in the season 6 episode "Tales of Terror" from One Foot in the Grave. A generous gift of some black pudding causes him to worry that he might have bowel cancer.