There was something revelatory about the taste of this bookish young pharmacist… who clearly and inarguably preferred minor works to major ones. He chose “The Metamorphosis” over “The Trial,” he chose “Bartleby” over “Moby-Dick,” he chose “A Simple Heart” over “Bouvard and Pécuchet,” and “A Christmas Carol” over “A Tale of Two Cities” or “The Pickwick Papers.” What a sad paradox, thought Amalfitano. Now even bookish pharmacists are afraid to take on the great, imperfect, torrential works, books that blaze paths into the unknown. They choose the perfect exercises of the great masters. Or what amounts to the same thing: they want to watch the great masters spar, but they have no interest in real combat, when the great masters struggle against that something, that something that terrifies us all, that something that cows us and spurs us on, amid blood and mortal wounds and stench.
– Roberto Bolano, “2666”
Fruit Thief 