What to Read?
I am an avid reader as many of you know. For me a great day is having several good books, a warm sunny day, sitting out on my back porch, feet propped up, a cup of Starbucks at hand, and hours of reading ahead!
The frustrating part for me is how to choose books to read. I probably have a backlog of 10 to 20 books that I really want to read, but just can't get to them. Then I will see other books in magazines or journals that look interesting and I order them, only to make my reading list longer. Sometimes parishioners hand me interesting books. My interests far exceed my ability to actually read about them. Sadly, I rarely read fiction. I read one or maybe two books of fiction in the last year. I am a Lincoln fan and have two books on Lincoln that a couple of folks from the church have lent me, and I only am 20 pages into one. I don't know when I 'm going to finish it and am afraid that it will be later rather than sooner. The other one looks equally as good and have no clue when I will be able to begin reading it.
Then there are the great books that I never read in high school or college but would like to read. Several years ago I started (notice the emphasis on started) reading The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer which discusses great books and how to go about reading them. Early on I became overwhelmed and never finished it (nor have I read any of the books that she recommended since!). In the last fifteen years or so (before beginning The Well-Educated Mind) I have read Homer's Iliad, Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Jane Austin's Pride and Prejudice, and reread Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. That's it.
So my question: how do you choose the books that you read? Do you ever purchase books that you intend to read and then never read them? I'm pretty good about reading the books that I buy, but I bet there are 10-20 percent of them that I never read/fully read. [I used to think that it was almost a sin (OK, I can be pretty neurotic) not to finish a book that you started. But now I have the freedom to stop if it isn't doing anything for me.] How about you?
The frustrating part for me is how to choose books to read. I probably have a backlog of 10 to 20 books that I really want to read, but just can't get to them. Then I will see other books in magazines or journals that look interesting and I order them, only to make my reading list longer. Sometimes parishioners hand me interesting books. My interests far exceed my ability to actually read about them. Sadly, I rarely read fiction. I read one or maybe two books of fiction in the last year. I am a Lincoln fan and have two books on Lincoln that a couple of folks from the church have lent me, and I only am 20 pages into one. I don't know when I 'm going to finish it and am afraid that it will be later rather than sooner. The other one looks equally as good and have no clue when I will be able to begin reading it.
Then there are the great books that I never read in high school or college but would like to read. Several years ago I started (notice the emphasis on started) reading The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer which discusses great books and how to go about reading them. Early on I became overwhelmed and never finished it (nor have I read any of the books that she recommended since!). In the last fifteen years or so (before beginning The Well-Educated Mind) I have read Homer's Iliad, Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Jane Austin's Pride and Prejudice, and reread Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. That's it.
So my question: how do you choose the books that you read? Do you ever purchase books that you intend to read and then never read them? I'm pretty good about reading the books that I buy, but I bet there are 10-20 percent of them that I never read/fully read. [I used to think that it was almost a sin (OK, I can be pretty neurotic) not to finish a book that you started. But now I have the freedom to stop if it isn't doing anything for me.] How about you?
posted by UCC Medfield at 11:58 AM
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