As a child, do you remember which book made you say, "I will learn to read?"

For me it was Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam (translated by Edward FitzGerald, Random House, 1947). The color illustrations and gilded borders were nothing like I was accustomed to growing up in a small, northern New Jersey town. No reference points except a wanting to experience.


Nothing like your first book; nothing like a Jersey tomato.