Rummaging through many an unrelated section of a Reading bookstore, I came upon James Elkins’ Our Beautiful, Dry, and Distant Texts: Art History as Writing.[1] I decided to buy it before I opened it and leafed through it. Although the randomly selected pages amply reassured me in my decision, I would have bought the book on the strength of its title alone. That is how important is a book’s title.

Footnote

1. New York and London: Routledge, 2000.