Or Sit….Some thoughts about reading.
Charles Elliott, of Alfred A. Knopf, in his article “How to Read Proust” recommends you read at a desk. “A desk forces you to stay upright in a fairly stiff posture. As a rule the light is good. A hard chair, especially one with arms, is preferable to a chair with padding. Do not read in bed. It is impossible to stay awake. Of course some people have fallen into the regrettable habit of reading to put themselves to sleep, for which they have special ‘bed books’ of a soothing and soporific nature. It should be recognized that reading and sleep are the two great antithetic activities.”
Where, dear reader, do you do your best reading? I like to read at the lunch or breakfast table, with some coffee, hot, and plenty of napkins for quick dabs at spills. Reading is not a social activity, so reading at the table should not be seen as rude as long as any companions also have something to read.
After you settle on a place and reading posture, you are faced with which mode of book consumption to choose. Much has been written about whether ebooks, audiobooks, or hard copy are best. If you are here, you probably are in the printed book camp. Yes, you found this online, but here you find suggestions for books that you will enjoy in your own time sitting up straight in your own special reading spot. Listening to a book is not the same activity as reading at all, no matter what your book club people say. What if you want to review a sentence or thought that struck you and there are no page numbers? What if the reader’s voice is irritating? Only print gives you the freedom to create a character’s voice and tone in your head. Distractions are minimized when a printed book is in your hands.
“A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little good.” Samuel Johnson
What is more freeing than to finish a course of required reading? What you choose to read is now up to you. You get ideas and suggestions and lists from friends, but their taste is not yours. I once was asked to select some good fiction library books for a friend who was recovering at home from surgery. I knew this person’s taste was almost the opposite of mine, so my selection tool was looking for titles I would not read unless there were no other options. My friend loved the choices!
Children should have lots of choices. They don’t know what kinds of books they like yet. When you take your child to the library, let them leave with a stack. Out of the stack some will be winners and some will be rejected. Such is life, you books. I recall hearing a mother at my library check-out telling her son, through clenched teeth, that he would choose ONE book for his book report and finish it. Don’t think that was a reading household. Committed readers usually are reading several books at once, shifting from a serious title to a funny one, a difficult book to a page-turner, depending on the amount of time they have or what their mood suggests.
Parents should not be overely concerned about reading levels. If a child wants to re-read a book they loved two years ago, it might be below their current ability. If it is just for fun, not a book report, who cares? Some of the books I read when I was 35 are still pretty good.
Which books stay with you?
“The most influential books and the truest in their influence are works of fiction. They do not pin the reader to a dogma which he must afterwards discover to be inexact; they do not teach him a lesson which he must afterwards unlearn. They repeat, they clarify the lessons of life; they disengage us from ourselves; they constrain us to the acquaintance of others; and they show us the web of experience, not as we can see it for ourselves but with a singular change-that monstrous, consuming ego of ours being, for the nonce, struck out.”
from “Books Which Have Influenced Me” by Robert Louis Stevenson
My collection of quotations about reading and books is large, patient reader, but you have been polite and so your reward is that we are done for today. Which books influenced you as a young reader? As a 35-year-old?
