Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen: Reflections on Sixty and Beyond

Not having been an avid reader of westerns, this is the first of McMurtry's books I've read. I'm not even sure why I picked it up at the used bookstore, other than a vague memory that besides having written a great many good novels (or at least people said they were good), he was the owner of an enormous number of books and therefore at least partially a kindred soul.

This short collection of essays covers so much ground and manages to be both so simple and so multilayered and complex, that it's hard to describe. It is, in a sense, a memoir, but more than that, it's an interweaving of ideas about the end of the brief and arduous life of frontier settlers and cowboys, the art of story-telling, the experience and value of reading, and the show more world of book scouting/book collecting, which appears even more today to be dying. Having given such an unsatisfactory summary, let me try to make it up to you by simply saying that if you love books, if you have a sense of nostalgia for the past--regardless of where your past may lie--and if you actually think sometimes about the value of storytelling, this book is likely to touch you deeply.

I read a lot. About a book every day or two. This one, at only about 200 pages, I took two weeks to read. Not because it was slow or difficult. Although it certainly gave me plenty to think about and I'll definitely read it again to see what I've missed, it was entirely enjoyable. I found myself slowing down, lolligagging as it were, because I didn't want this conversation to end. And it did feel like a conversation. Despite the differences in our ages, genders, and geographic roots, I found much in common with McMurtry. It was like meeting a friend you haven't seen in years and finding that the connection you once shared hasn't changed at all--except, of course, I've never met McMurtry and likely never will. I'm tempted, of course, to make a pilgrimage of sorts to Archer City, Texas, to explore the remaining quarter million volumes of his once-larger bookstore, to see what his offerings reveal of this man who so cogently expresses thoughts I've long harbored. Instead, I think I'll take a look at more of his work and encourage my friends to do the same. show less

McMurtry's essays/lit crit/memoir reinvigorates my love of books. Starting with a recollection of reading WalterBenjamin on storytelling in a Texan Dairy Queen, he enkindles my reluctant desire to read Proust, to reread Virginia Woolf, to explore more classics in next year's Reading Challenge. He strikes horror in my chest describing the emotional effects of his open heart surgery in the 1990's. For the first time in four decades, he COULD NOT READ and it lasted over two years before he contentedly picked up a book.
He discusses his family heritage: the myth and reality of cowboys and cattle ranching on the mesquite-snarled prairies of his family grazing land which would have been better served by raising buffalo.
Next I've picked up his show more volume entitled Books as if I needed to add any titles to my burgeoning To Read list. show less

McMurtry's essays/lit crit/memoir reinvigorates my love of books. Starting with a recollection of reading WalterBenjamin on storytelling in a Texan Dairy Queen, he enkindles my reluctant desire to read Proust, to reread Virginia Woolf, to explore more classics in next year's Reading Challenge. He strikes horror in my chest describing the emotional effects of his open heart surgery in the 1990's. For the first time in four decades, he COULD NOT READ and it lasted over two years before he contentedly picked up a book.
He discusses his family heritage: the myth and reality of cowboys and cattle ranching on the mesquite-snarled prairies of his family grazing land which would have been better served by raising buffalo.
Next I've picked up his show more volume entitled Books as if I needed to add any titles to my burgeoning To Read list. show less

Lively and very personal account of growing up in West Texas and the sources of his love of books Very poingant depiction of the hard, austere existence of the earliest pioneers and the contrast with his own obsession with books. Some discouraging views on the role and future of fiction and on the myth of the cowboy

I checked out at the point where he started ranting about how not sharing dinner has ruined family life in America. Please. I was a single mom in the 80s and 90s, and we had dinner together every night. It's like that perennial 'funny' story about how college freshmen mangle history. Been there, read that.

A lot of concern decrying the loss of memory after books took over for the oral traditions and took away the storytelling memories. The Greeks and Walter Benjamin, an early 20th century critic both resent this development. From my perspective, the chapter on book scouting makes the book all worthwhile and wading through the other laments, such has there never really being a cowboy for any length of time and that the cattle business was never profitable, largely because ranchers tried to make the European cow work, when it should have been the Mexican cows from the start, at lleast tolerable. McMurtry sums up book scouting in two words, 'the quest'. Composing a great bookstore is a lot like writing a novel. Parts of that I can see, as in show more patiently curating the right stock, but the anology quickly falls apart in my mind. Although it is easy to conceive the theory that successful scouting rests on an accumulation of knowledge, just as in a novel. It seems that it is still essential to have the Amazon app handy because the values of books I remember from 20, or even 5 years ago, can be easily outdated, usually downward. After all Larry feels that most booksellers are only semi-literate or more precisely specifically literate to the areas where they have chosen to continue to read. To this author reading is knowledge and book dealers have to choose to either read or peddle the books and, of course, they must peddle the books. I can testify to the fact that my reading has increased in both breadth and depth since my retirement some 15 years ago. show less

Working in a library and a lover of books and stories since I was a child this book appealed to my senses in numerous ways. After reading it, I finished it just yesterday on an airplane flight from Virginia to Chicago....I feel like I could read it again and again and never grow tired. I love when authors pass along other authors and reads and books that inspired them. McMurtry does this throughout the entire book, enough so, that the interlibrary loan copy I have from UL Lafayette library has several dog-eared pages so I can go back and look up titles. With that said, I feel that I need to own this book for future reference. This book is for anyone who loves memoir, books, stories, history, Texas, cowboys and cowgirls, reading, and show more reflection. I am happy to have found it and will head over to Amazon.com for a beat up used copy. This one is a keeper. I hope you enjoy as much as I did. show less