Megsie

[Note: The following is a guest post that I wrote for my friend's blog, The Ugly Green Sofa. She is neither ugly nor green, and definitely not a sofa, but funny, sincere and a wonderful friend. She's also the author of a novel whose main character is named after me, Megan and the Great Fish. Go read her blog.]

How to Read All the Books You Want

First off, you can’t. If you’re anything like me, a bibliophile and a consummate slacker, you’ll always be buried up to your nose in good books; after all, books have been around much longer than you have and therefore have an unfair head-start. Don’t be discouraged! You can make headway with a little self-discipline and a lot of self-patience.

Here’s the harsh truth: one, reading takes away from time spent on facebook; two, facebook will (probably) be there when you finish the book (and maybe you’ll even have something more interesting to say than, “Check ur [obscenity synonymous with "crap" deleted] b4 u check mine”*). It is easy to default to the simplest forms of entertainment, especially when stressed or busy, but, much like physically exercising, reading a good book for an hour is much more satisfying than wasting that same hour on the internet or watching mind-numbing television (two words: TiVo, Hulu. Watch the shows you want, without them dictating your life).

I’m an extremely frenetic reader, so my advice will only be valuable if you have the attention span of a squirrel, which, based upon reading the previous contributors, is probably not many of you. I salute you. My advice is for those of us who are not literary giants, but still love reading. I must confess, have a terrible habit of beginning a book and, whether I love it or not, losing interest midway through and setting it aside. Thus, I have bookshelves full of unfinished books, but I keep buying more. Erasmus said, “when I get a little money, I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes.” This phrase acquired new meaning to me after I lost my job in July, yet continued buying books. I have since purchased six books, and been given another eight. So what if I am still wearing clothes from high school? I have books to sustain me. Noble aspirations aside, though, half those books remain unread, and all of them unfinished. How is this justifiable? It is truly a terribly travesty.

My solution to this problem is exponentially more productive than my previous one of mental self-flagellation for my total and abject failure as a reader. My new plan involves less sack cloth and fewer ashes (do you have any idea how hard it is to acquire ashes these days? Very few wood stoves still around). It’s simple, really. So simple, in fact, you will be astounded. Here it is, the definitive answer for How to Read All the Books You Want:

1. Finish the books you have started.
2. Start new books.
3. Repeat steps one and two as needed until you have read all the books you want.

I’ll bet you feel pretty silly now for not thinking of that yourself.

Some suggestions for this: for every new book that you want to read, find two or three books that you started and never finished, want to re-read, or are easy reads. This way you’re always having successful reading because you are continually finishing books. If I’m reading a difficult or dry work (such as anything political, philosophical, or scientific), I allow myself fluffier side reads. I also try to plan time in advance so that I can be focussed and prepared. When I was unemployed, I had a lot of spare time, but did not structure that time very well and thus did not read nearly as much as I could have. Now that I am working full time, I have less time, but am actually reading more because I’m making a conscious effort to use my free time more carefully. To accomplish this, I bring whatever book I’m working on with me in my gigantic purse (sorry guys, you’ll just have to carry yours by hand, the normal way) and open it at every opportunity. This yields an hour at lunch, and usually scattered increments of fifteen to twenty minutes throughout the evening and five or six hours on the weekends (especially now that Seattle’s rainy winter has begun and all outdoor activities are limited to swimming with clothes on).

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve finished ten books in this way, which is excellent progress and gives me encouragement to keep reading. My greatest triumph was finishing four books in one day, even though I only started one of them that day, that’s four more books that can no longer mock me from my bookshelves (books can be so very cruel). I still have many, many more books to read, but the task is exciting rather than daunting now. Happy reading!

*actual status update by an actual friend. Not sure why we remain friends, other than my sense of guilt.

I recently re-read the Chronicles of Narnia (as in, I just finished up the Seventh book a few minutes ago) and, delightful as they were, the experience was somewhat different from the entirely innocent books I remembered from my childhood. Do not misunderstand, I still love these stories, but age and cynicism (and my shattered belief in the gospel truth of Everything C.S. Lewis Ever Wrote) have necessarily changed my reading. Lewis, like the rather more rabid Conservative Christians his philosophising begat, is suspicious of all things liberal and P.C. (you know, radical things like attending co-ed schools, or being vegetarians or, you know, not being racist). I don’t altogether mind these suspicions (vegetarians ARE weird, and the jovial way that he portrays these concerns is vastly different from the rabid fear-mongering common among the Christian Right today), but it is nonetheless a little jarring at first.

Five Lessons Lewis Didn’t Intend to Impart:

1. Anyone who doesn’t drink or smoke is probably a traitor, or at least a “wet-blanket”.

2. Dark-skinned peoples are cunning and tricky and should be viewed with suspicion.

3. Tall, beautiful, women are evil witches.

4. Unless they are fair-skinned and fair-haired, then they are good. Obviously.

5. Aslan is a thousand times better and more exciting than his earthly counterpart, Jesus. (Why else would the children keep trying to get to Narnia?)

Now that I’ve probably ruined the books for you, I’ll just say that if you are going to read these wonderful pieces of Christian propaganda (and, tongue no longer in cheek, I really do recommend them as pleasurable and imaginative stories) you will be best served to either have a good understanding of, and affinity for, the Christian faith, or next to no knowledge of it at all. Anyone in between will find the allegory a bit hard to digest at times. Unless you are under the age of twelve. Or possibly ten, in these cynical times. In which case, stop reading my blog immediately. It’s not fit for children.