I look up from my book, a birthday present. The man who had served me coffee twenty minutes earlier is standing to my left, speaking and gesturing towards the book in my hand. When he served the coffee, he was slow and somewhat distracted, being pestered by a new colleague who kept asking him questions and pulling him away from the matter in hand; namely making my mocha. I thought him slightly rude, but thought no more about it as I found a sofa to sit on, sat down and turned to Chapter 3.
Dreams of My Father was written by a relatively unknown 33 year old, editor of the Harvard Review. The first black editor, mind, but outside of readers of the Harvard Review, the name meant little. That was in 1995. The book was re-published in 2004 when he made that keynote speech at the Democratic Convention and was running for Senate. It was only published in Britain for the first time in 2007 when he announced he was seeking the Democratic nomination for the Presidency. And now it's a best seller. For some reason.
You know, if book sales were related to the skills of the author then this book would have trounced JK Rowling (who would be languishing in the obscurity her writing so richly deserves). It's selling now, because of what just happened, not because he's a damn fine writer. And I'm reading it now, not because he is a beautiful wordsmith, but because he's President-elect. Not that I've ever read anything by an American President or any President for that matter. I did once read a novel by Disraeli, but he was long dead and I don't really recall much of it and I was studying 19th Century British history at the time.
And all the time I'm reading this book, I'm thinking, damn, this man is the President of the US. The same job that Dubya stole and held onto for eight years. Talk about from the ridiculous to the sublime. Maybe this is a Mandela moment; that moment when he walked triumphantly out of prison and with such grace became the leader of South Africa. Maybe there is hope for the world when a man such as Obama can become President in a country such as the US.
I focus on what the barista is saying now. In Obama's words he's as "black as pitch", and speaking with a strong African accent, maybe even Kenyan , I don't know. And he's saying that he's been trying to buy that book and he can't find a copy. And I tell him how I got it and which shops I've seen it in. And then we exchange our awe about how Obama has become President. And then he wanders off, smiling. And I'm smiling. And I think how I can't recall anyone ever commenting in that way on a book I was reading. And I thought how this man and his book had brought a white boy from England together with a black boy from Africa and for five minutes we had something in common. And maybe good will triumph despite the efforts of the Cheneys, Mugabes, Thatchers and Idi Amins.
It is a brilliant book regardless of what the author went on to do next. But it is also a brilliant book precisely because of what he did next. For once, as Jon Stewart of the Daily Show said, there is a man in the White House who seems to see the world in much the same way as I do. I can't remember ever feeling that way before. I hope I still feel that way in four years, I really do.
