The Grinch was born in a nameless mountain town, just north of Who-ville, and studied economics and business via correspondence classes. (He appears in the photo at left, last Friday visiting Seattle's
Space Needle just before appearing at Third Place Books in Lake Forest
Park.) His memoir, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, which describes his attempts to halt the holiday in nearby Who-ville, was published in 1957 and became a bestseller, the basis for an animated film in 1966, a live-action film starring Jim Carrey (2000), and is now a Broadway musical. On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of his memoir's publication, the Grinch answered questions we put to people in the book business:
On your nightstand now:
The Age of Turbulence by Alan Greenspan, Le Misanthrope by Molière, Be the Pack Leader by Cesar Millan (for my dog, Max), Bad Santa (DVD) and Max's antlers
Favorite book when you were a child:
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. (O.K., favorite children's book--I had no books as a child.)
Your top five authors:
Shel Silverstein, David Mamet, Ayn Rand, Jean-Paul Sartre, Charles Dickens
Book you've faked reading:
Silas Marner by George Eliot
Book you are an evangelist for:
No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre
Book you've bought for the cover:
Good Dog. Stay. by Anna Quindlen
Favorite line from a book:
"If I could work my will," said Scrooge indignantly, "every idiot who goes about with 'Merry Christmas' on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart."
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
The Stranger by Albert Camus