On pretending to have read books
thecritic.co.uk
On pretending to have read books
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Re: On pretending to have read books
#2No post body was provided.
Re: On pretending to have read books
#3I thought for sure this essay would reference Pierre Bayard's really fun How to Talk About Books You Haven't Read. Oh well!
Anyway, I think there are at least three kinds of reading.
The one where you skim some reviews and read twenty pages is one of them. You can do this in order to just be able to say you've read something without putting in the "work", but you can also do this as part of a serious study of some subject: For example, maybe I only need to read a specific chapter in a book to answer a question I have, or I only need to check every page that mentions a specific keyword related to what I'm studying.
Another way of reading is when you march through a book, page-by-page, as quickly as possible. When you get to the last page you say "done" and then you move on. A few months later, all you mat remember about the book is a outline of the plot, in a novel, or maybe one or two important points, in a non-fiction book.
(I think listening to books in audiobook format is another way of reading, but in practice it's often very close to this second form)
The last one is when you read the book, then think about it, then read it again, then read about it, then keep reading it over and over for the rest of your life.
The latter is much more rewarding, but my point is not that one is better than the other, but that all of these are separate activities that can legitimately be called reading. Maybe we need more words for reading.
Re: On pretending to have read books
#4If I read this it will ruin a good joke.
Re: On pretending to have read books
#5To be fair, reading a book and engaging in a conversation about a book are two utterly different bags. And engaging in a conversation about a book is often way more fun. And shifting gears between the two modes is difficult. So you really can't blame people for faking it.
Re: On pretending to have read books
#6I’d never heard of this publication before but the way this article so casually and confidently touted the importance their own literary reviews made me feel like I ought to have! I looked up their launch editorial[1] (from 2019) and it seems they’re angling to be a(n ostensibly) “middle of the road”/both sides are bad New Yorker with funding from Jeremy Hosking[2].
[1]https://thecritic.co.uk/issues/november-2019/introducing-the...
Re: On pretending to have read books
#7I thought for sure this essay would reference Pierre Bayard's really fun How to Talk About Books You Haven't Read . Oh well! Anyway, I think there are at least three kinds of reading. The one where you skim some reviews and read twenty pages is one of them. You can do this in order to just be able to say you've read something without putting in the "work", but you can also do this as part of a serious study of some s…
It’s worth having some form of takeaway from a book, even if it’s just one profound paragraph that resonated with you, and the rest can be filtered out. I mostly read self help, and have managed to boil some books down to a little kernel of truth that I use daily to help me navigate life. Holding a whole book in your head can be done.
Re: On pretending to have read books
#8People ask me why I buy some many books when obviously I haven't read them all - I usually ask them if they wear all their clothes all the time.
I think it is is perfectly fine not to finish a book. Or read a few chapters to see if you like it. Or skip the introductions or the notes. Or even just read the notes (I have an awesome translation of the Odyssey - the notes are more enjoyable than the poem!). I usually don't finish long book series.
I have books that I've collected for another time where I would enjoy them. Perhaps a vacation or sick leave.
Point is, there are many ways to enjoy books, and we should feel more open about it and less judgemental of the way others enjoy them.
Re: On pretending to have read books
#9I thought for sure this essay would reference Pierre Bayard's really fun How to Talk About Books You Haven't Read . Oh well! Anyway, I think there are at least three kinds of reading. The one where you skim some reviews and read twenty pages is one of them. You can do this in order to just be able to say you've read something without putting in the "work", but you can also do this as part of a serious study of some s…
> The last one is when you read the book, then think about it, then read it again, then read about it, then keep reading it over and over for the rest of your life.
Agree. Would love to see examples from people of books that fall in this category. I assume it is a short list for most people.
Re: On pretending to have read books
#10Is anyone else thrown by the lack of editing here? There are a couple things that read oddly but might just be regional wordings, but other sentences seem like they can't have passed under an editor's nose. Yikes.