On a dull and grey Sunday I finished True Grit, a novel so alive with dialogue and storytelling bravado that I was left somewhat stunned.
I cannot remember a time that I read a work of fiction that made me forget I was reading; I thought fearless 14-year-old Mattie was sitting with me, recounting her adventures with Marshall Rooster Cogburn and the Texas Ranger LaBoeuf. For sheer genius, there is nothing like the six pages of dialogue between Mattie and cotton trader Colonel G. Stonehill, whom Mattie implores to buy back the horses he sold her now dead father.
A delightful afterword by Donna Tartt, recounts her True Grit family history, hoarding copies of the novel, and compares the narrative style to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, a work I have not read in so long I must now reacquaint myself.
Perfect project for a rainy Sunday…