How Green Was My Valley

Yup, so I was wandering around the library this morning, just sort of looking for the old raggedy spines tucked in among the shiny "thrillers" and who-done-its. I happen to be in the L section, and there it was, Richard Llewellyn's How Green Was My Valley.

I had mentioned it yesterday as one of my favorite old books, and thought I might go back to it, so thirsty was I for something truly stirring and wonderful. Yes, it still stirs. The opening pages are beautiful, and the story unwinds in the form of serial recollections of a young man at one of life's crossroads. After every page or so I want to put it down and walk around the house wondering why they don't write books like this anymore.

Interestingly, the film version, made in 1941 and directed by the great John Ford, had its world premier in my home town of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.