Paul Giamatti reading Austen?

[MsAmerica]

Okay, I know this is silly, but I found it endearing when science-fiction devotee Paul Giamatti mentioned, when interviewed by comedian Stephen Colbert, that he's reading Jane Austen.

:)

Love Paul Giametti. Did not know he was a sci fi devotee

But yes

Oh, YEAH. I remember a previous interview with Stephen Colbert where he talked about it. Colbert, meanwhile, is such a Tolkien fiend that the other night he appeared to be actually reading aloud something in Elvish.

I don’t find it surprising. Jane Austen has lasted for a reason - she’s really good. Whenever I return to Austen or Dickens or George Eliot or Virginia Woolf or the Brontes I am always amazed at how beautiful and entertaining their novels are. Harold Bloom once said that we make progress in science or technology, but not in the arts. No poet in the last 400 years has rivalled Shakespeare, and no modern novelist rivals Tolstoy or Proust.

Well, in my world, men rarely spontaneously enthuse over a 19th century woman writer.