The meme came from The Hermit's Notebook. I had come across memes here and there in the blogosphere, and had sort of an idea what they were, but I didn't understand the name. I was thinking circumflex and self-referential? Wrong. Wikipedia enlightened me and as it turns out, Wikipedia is a meme itself:

Meme, (rhymes with "cream" and comes from Greek root with the meaning of memory and its derivative "mimeme"), is the term given to a unit of information that replicates from brains and inanimate stores of information, such as books and computers, to other brains or stores of information.

So here it goes, replicated from my brain to your computer (by way of translating it from Mentalese into English and typing it up)

You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be?

I don't have the cultural reference for this. I sort of know what it is about, but never actually read the book, so I'll pass. (That sort of thing happens to me a lot).

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?

Oh yes, when I was in my early twenties, I deeply adored the autobiographical narrator of Proust's Recherche. I dropped everything I was supposed to be doing and, for an entire year, I threw myself into the books. A new annotated German translation was coming out and I was waiting for each of the individual volumes as they appeared in the bookstores, one by one. What torture! I read each volume at least two to three times, and made copious notes. I was seriously afflicted. It took me a long time to get over it, and to start reading other stuff again. These were the days when I could just blow off an entire year ...

The last book you bought was?

A couple of Cynthia Rylant's Henry and Mudge books for a sixth birthday. For a grown-up birthday gift: Chez Panisse: Fruit by Alice Waters.
For myself, the last shipment from Amazon was: Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors, Oxford Guide to Style, Mes Confitures: the Jams and Jellies of Christine Ferber by Christine Ferber, Putting Food By, Fourth Edition, by Janet Greene et al.

The last book you read was?

The last book I read was a book in German that I found at a used book store Die Überfliegerin by Angela Krauss, a (former) East German author. She had won some prestigious awards, but as far as I can see, none of her major works have been translated into English. And I doubt they ever will be. European prose is much more artsy and "experimental" (a word often used contemptuously by critics in the US) than prose manufactured in American workshops. In general I find American prose well-crafted, albeit, somewhat formulaic, whereas European writers are more out on a limb, fumbling around without a sheet of guidelines in their hands. As with Krauss' novella, there often is a much freer use of language and a lot of poetry in the prose, but the over-all structure may be less carefully executed.

What are you currently reading?

I started How To Be Alone, a collection of essays by Jonathan Franzen, I don't quite know why I started reading this, I guess, because it was around. I am not a fan of Franzen, and already read most of the essays anyway when they were published in the New Yorker.
The Oxford Guide to Style. Yes, I read that kind of thing front-to-back, I am that weird.
I am also reading Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, to keep up with my daughter and because I never read it in the original.

Five books you'd take to a deserted island?

The Iliad and the Odyssey by Homer, Oxford Classical texts, along with commentaries by Kirk et al. on the Iliad and Heubeck/West on the Odyssey, and Liddell, Scott, Jones Greek-English Lexicon. On a deserted island anything contemporary or current will be outdated or irrelevant before too long. And this will keep me busy, let me work with language and give me a lot to think about. If a I had a lot of time on my hand I would definitely go back and read Homer.
Where is this island and how do I get there?

Who will you pass this stick (3 persons) on to, and why?

I am passing it to Rhye because I would like to get to know her better and she probably has some interesting things to say. I am also passing it to Mark although I think he may have been tapped already but I don't think he has responded yet. So, just do it, ok?
Everyone I "know" in the blogosphere seems to have answered already, so I will pass it to my daughter, because she is not as sick as she pretends to be and this will give her something to do.  11:13:03 AM