I've been thinking a lot lately about how much less I've been reading. As a kid I picked up books and just devoured them, loving the far off places and adventures they had the potential to take me on. That's what we always tell kids right? A book will take you on an adventure! An adventure! Last time I checked sitting at home on my bed reading series of books does not stand out in my mind as a defining point in my adolescent life. I think that's probably what made me a little socially awkward and gave me a total lack of interest in the opposite sex. Reading made me gay.
I read books it takes me a week to finish now because they are practical. I can fit them into my schedule. I know when I begin it when I will be finished it. I read books that are funny because I like to laugh, I think they have a light perspective on the world and they're a nice contrast to the news, I read books with interesting opinions and facts--and yes--I read books with some sex in them. Because with all of its similes and metaphors book sex is pretty much the pinnacle of humour. Rubyfruit Jungle wins for incorporating a hilarious vagina metaphor into its title.
But am I reading enough of them? Probably not. My mother used to always read romance novels when I was a child and my father war stories and I never understood them. I thought: why aren't you reading great works of literature? Now I realize after years of schooling: because they're probably obtuse, boring, and after you figure out what the hell is going on, you'll be a little disappointing with the time wasted.
I've discussed this with a friend and we agree this doesn't mean reading is dead. People read emails all day, people read the internet all day. But the adventure we go on is the ultimate 'choose your own adventure'. If I want information I can have it moments later, I can read exactly what I want to. I can preach to myself (the converted) what I want to hear--and that's what makes me uneasy because we've become a culture of educated people preaching to themselves. Plays are put on for actors, liberal television media preach to the liberally educated, conservative media to the conservatives.
But...I like what I read now, school's no longer forcing me to read Lois Lowry's The Giver and as much as I respect the Giller prize I know I'll be more intrigued to read a book that has some bright colours and "heels on the cover" as one friend phrased it.
One man has taken it upon himself to mail Stephen Harper some quality books to make him a better person. But looking over the list and spotting Beckett and Strinberg I have to ask the question: do you want him to commit suicide after reading some of the most bleak authors of-- uhhh I would say: ever? And who is this man who is sending the prime minister a new library? This brilliant witty gesture is created by none other than Yann Martel, author of Life of Pi. Yann, I didn't like your book (too many animals), but I salute you. You read those books, you loved them and you told someone else who mattered. Rather than sending it off to your leftist commie friends, you wrote the fucking prime minister.
But what about other important books the prime minister should be reading? Ones that are a little sexier, ones that I should be reading and then also sending to the prime minister. Please post your responses here. I need me a good book. No historical romantic fiction or fantasy need apply.
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