Lists of books we reread and books we can't finish tell more about us than about the relative worth of the books themselves.
Interpretation
The books we choose to revisit or abandon reveal our true selves more than those books' inherent value.
This quote suggests that our reading habits reflect our personalities and preferences more than the actual merits of the books we encounter. Rereading certain books indicates a personal connection or understanding, while books we cannot finish may symbolize mismatches with our interests, values, or emotional readiness. In essence, our literary choices tell a story about who we are, illuminating our tastes, thoughts, and life experiences.
In practice
During a book club discussion on personal growth, I shared this quote to emphasize how our reading choices can reflect our inner selves.
Public libraries are the sole community centers left in America. The degree to which a branch of the local library is connected to the larger culture is a reflection of the degree to which the community itself is connected to the larger culture.
They were gone and I missed them but even so I was very happy. For the rest of my life no matter where on this planet earth I went and no matter how scared or confused I got, I could wait until dark and look up into the night sky and see my three friends again and my heart would swell with love of them and make me strong and clearheaded.
I much prefer working with kids whose life could be completely upended by a reading of a book over a weekend. You give them a book to read - they go home and come back a changed person. And that is so much more interesting and exciting.
Motivations are too tangled and complex.
Through writing, through that process, they realize that they become more intelligent, and more honest and more imaginative than they can be in any other part of their life.
There is something I keep wanting to say about reading short stories. I am doing it now, because I many never have another occasion. Stories are not chapters of novels. They should not be read one after another, as if they were meant to follow along. Read one. Shut the book. Read something else. Come back later. Stories can wait.
Most crime fiction, no matter how 'hard-boiled' or bloodily forensic, is essentially sentimental, for most crime writers are disappointed romantics.
I loathe people who say, 'I always read the ending of the book first.' That really irritates me, It's like someone coming to dinner, just opening the fridge and eating pudding, while you're standing there still working on the starter. It's not on.
You don't put your life into your books, you find it there.
I don't believe chance can play a role in my literature.
We can be reluctant to recognize how much of our culture was literary, particularly now that so many of the institutional purveyors of literature happily have joined in proclaiming its death. A substantial number of Americans who believe they worship God actually worship three major literary characters: the Yahweh of the J Writer (earliest author of Genesis, Exodus, Numbers), the Jesus of the Gospel of Mark, and Allah of the Koran.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.