I did not come from a family of storytellers. Although my father was inventive, poetic, adorable, and loving he was not chatty. Getting him to talk was like trying to pry opened a time capsule with a tulip.

My mother was always willing to talk about the past, but most of her stories were about her siblings, her parents, and growing up in Canada.

For stories on a Grand Scale, I had to look elsewhere.

Which was not difficult, because “elsewhere” for me was old films and books. And it was from them that I learned about the two major events that I always wished I could have experienced personally.

Let’s start with World War II.

I am absolutely certain that even before I saw the MGM movie Mrs. Miniver, I had perceived Londoners during the Blitz as brave, resilient, indomitable and resolute. I knew that people crowded down into the underground to wait for bombing raids to end, and that while there, they listened to concerts, fell in love, knitted socks, slept, and persevered. To me, the idea of those brave Brits going about their day-to-day affairs was a lesson in nobility. Yes, there is war. Yes, there is evil. Yes, death hovers overhead like a thug with a crowbar. But … one must keep his chin up, his spirits elevated, and his courage in tact.

I have a wonderful book of photographs called “The Hulton Getty Picture Collection – 1940s.” On the front cover is a man in a white jacket carrying a basket filled with bottles of fresh milk. The caption reads, “While firemen damp down the smouldering ruins behind him, a milkman picks his way through rubble to deliver the morning’s supply. Churchill’s words to Hitler voice the feeling of many Londoners: ‘You do your worst – and we will do our best’.”

This, in contrast to the many movies and books – often science fiction like Godzilla and War of the Worlds – in which Americans (usually New Yorkers), similarly under attack, are portrayed as hysterical whimps who step on the faces of their fallen brethren (usually children) while stampeding to escape.

Having neither friend nor neighbor who seemed inclined to claw out my eyes at the first hint of danger, these images did not sit well with me,

September 11, 2001 proved my instincts right and my fellow citizens as resilient, calm, and brave as any Brit during any Blitz. There is no need to recount stories here of how New Yorkers responded on that day, as every anniversary brings countless recollections of courage, generosity, and resolve. We Americans had been given our own test of valor, and in Mayor Rudy Giuliani, we had our Winston Churchill.

During the days, weeks and months that followed, my London Blitz envy finally disappeared. We, too, were capable of magnificence.

That was one of the two events I wished that I could have experienced. The other involved books. Not books found on contemporary bookshelves. Serialized books by the likes of Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle..

These wildly popular authors published their novels chapter-by-chapter, leaving readers panting after the next installment with anxiety, hope, and dread. What will happen to David Copperfield? Can Sherlock Holmes really be dead? Who stole The Moonstone diamond? Each segment ended with a cliffhanger; readers hung their hearts and souls on the fates of fictional events; and the books sold, sold, sold.