Chapter Thirty-Four Summary

Eugene continues telling the reader how disappointing it was to achieve a literacy rate of 20% at the prison. While this is considered quite respectable given most couldn't read or write, Eugene again laments their choices are largely as ignorant as their former illiteracy. He cites how the prisoners were fascinated with The Guiness Book of World Records. Because the book contains records of finite if often dubious distinction, Eugene recalls, the prisoners had found it comforting, as a sort of cultural version of the Bible. It had given them a worldview wherein all the great mysteries are answered and orderly. The world's richest person, the world's tallest person, and even the world's longest living person are all there, to be known, if one but asks. Because Eugene housed next to warden Matsumoto near the lakeside in the neighboring cottage, Eugene remembers...