Joyce Carol Oates
Great advice! I like to read, and I like to read widely. I like to read literature, and I like to read crime novels. I like to read biographies and I like to read some Romance. A lot depends on my mood and what I am seeking from a book - challenge or solace? Laughter or thoughtfulness? Brain food or empty headedness?
I certainly grew up feeling that one should read pretty much everything; but there was a definite bias towards sensible and serious books. Although thank goodness I was never pressured to read anything at all.
I read Georgette Heyer Regency Romances when I am feeling low or poorly or can't concentrate on much. I read literary fiction as often as I can; but I intersperse it with spy or crime novels for a quick hit. I stop reading crime novels when the darkness gets too much. And so on.
There must be nothing worse than feeling you can't read what you want to read, because folk will think poorly of you for it; or because they laugh at your choices; or pass judgement in some other way. It's good for all of us to be challenged to expand our reading circles (I am yet to make it into sci fi although I did read Project Hail Mary), but it is also good to be comfortable and read for enjoyment.
Should is definitely a word I am trying to eject from my vocabulary. It brings no good with it whatsoever. Reading something because somebody says you SHOULD read it almost sets me up for failure before I begin.
Just enjoy reading.
Enjoyed this - it's such good advice. Like you, I enjoy many types of writing and my mood tends to dictate what I gravitate toward but I do fall into the "trap" of thinking I should be reading (or have read) certain things. I love biographies but have come to understand they also almost always make me sad, lives lived and over, time passing, the reminder the world is only ours for a short time. I do have to pick and choose when I'm up for that...
ReplyDeleteIt is good to understand our rhythms and our needs for what reading can bring us, and what it brings with it. if I am in a place where the worries of the world are too many, I just can't add to that with reading tough books - I go light. Biographies are often bittersweet aren't they? Sometimes I read them after a person has died and they are more aching that way, and yes one must feel up for it. I am in a good patch at the moment reading lots of everything!
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