The Uncommon Reader

The novella opens on the Queen of England asking the president of France whether he’s acquainted with “the writer Jean Genet” (3). Taken off guard, the president feels unprepared to converse about a writer whom he hasn’t read. After this initial scene, the story moves back in time to the cause of the awkward interaction, which stems from the Queen beginning to read.

As the Queen’s dogs run “alongside of the house” (4), the Queen unexpectedly finds the “City of Westminster travelling library, a large removal-like van parked next to the bins outside one of the kitchen doors” (4-5). There are two men inside the library. As the Queen begins speaking to the driver, who is also the librarian, she relies on her sense of decorum. Although “she’d never taken much interest in reading” (6), she realizes that she will have to check out a book to be polite. The Queen asks the librarian, Mr. Hutchings, about how to borrow a book. Then the Queen asks the other young man, Mr. Norman Seakins, to choose a book for her.

That night, the Queen explains to her husband, the Duke, that there is “a travelling library” (9), and he expresses surprise. When it comes time for the Queen to return the book, she decides to go back to the library herself. The Queen discusses the book she read with Mr. Hutchings, which she found “a little dry” (11). He agrees and asks how far she was able to get through it. The Queen says, “Oh, to the end. Once I start a book I finish it” (11). The Queen looks around at the other books and discusses a title with Norman before checking out another book.

The Queen’s reading starts to be noticeable to the people around her, including her husband, the Duke, and her private secretary, Sir Kevin. The Queen requests that Sir Kevin bring up Norman, who works in the palace kitchens, to work for her instead. Norman is “emancipated from washing dishes and fitted (with some difficulty) into a page’s uniform” (15). Later that week, the Queen asks Norman to exchange her completed book for “anything else” (15) that she might like. Norman is anxious, in particular because “his reading tend[ed] to be determined by whether an author was gay or not” (16). After some discussion with Mr. Hutchings, Norman chooses the biography My Dog Tulip, arguing that the Queen won’t be able to tell that it’s a “gay” book because “she’ll think it’s just about the dog” (16).

The Queen continues reading, discussing each new text with Norman in detail. The more she reads, the more thoughtful she becomes about the various authors and characters she encounters. She begins to feel “regret, too, and mortification at the many opportunities she had missed” (21) earlier in her life.

As the Queen begins to share details of her reading with other members of her staff, like Sir Kevin, she meets resistance. The council controlling the traveling library eventually cancels the visits to the palace, so the queen brings Mr. Hutchings onto her staff so that she can continue to obtain new books. Sir Kevin is again unhappy with the Queen’s frequent reading, arguing that while reading is “not exactly elitist it sends the wrong message. It tends to exclude” (27). The Queen is unhappy with his critique and purposefully references his New Zealand background so that he will leave her alone. Yet after he leaves, the Queen still feels “troubled and wondering why it was at this particular time in her life she had suddenly felt the pull of books” (29).

Undeterred by recent criticisms, the Queen continues to read voraciously, with books “gradually [coming] to be her element” (31). The Queen’s duties, like opening Parliament, begin to feel more “burdensome” (32), and she begins hiding books in the coach with her so that she can read as she greets the public. One morning, after opening Parliament and returning to the vehicle, she finds her book has disappeared. The Queen discovers that security has removed and “exploded” (34) the book.

The Queen continues carrying out her duties with less enthusiasm, struggling through a visit to “Wales and to Scotland and to Lancashire” (38). Her staff, who brief people before they meet with the Queen, are forced to prepare those subjects for the inevitable question—“What are you reading at the moment?”—to which “very few of Her Majesty’s loyal subjects had a ready answer” (40-41).

While Sir Kevin continues to argue with the Queen about her reading habits, her family is “rather relieved” (45) with her neglect of them. As she reads more, the Queen identifies that she is an “opsimath: one who learns only late in life” (48). The Queen decides to invite her favorite authors to an afternoon tea, yet once they are there, she finds that “taken together [the authors] were loud, gossipy and […] not […] particularly funny” (50). She concludes that authors “were probably best met with in the pages of their novels” (52).

The Queen decides that she would like to experiment with reading to her subjects through a television broadcast. Although it is “slightly to her surprise” (57), the Queen gets to read a paragraph of A Tale of Two Cities on a Christmas broadcast to the nation. After a positive reception, the Queen is emboldened enough to read a poem at church. All her duties begin to feel like “a drag” (60) when compared with reading.