A Significant Failure?
About a year ago I had an idea that seemed pretty good at the time. I am, rightly, known for reading a significant number of books (not that I think 70 is significant but I’m afraid that the statistics regarding the reading – or lack of reading – in the general population prove it otherwise) yet still feel after all these years that I’m not particularly ‘well’ read. I’m addressing that by catching up with the classics (and it’s interesting to speculate exactly why they are considered as such) but felt the need for something more – reading significant books. Of course it didn’t help that I had no clear idea as to what exactly constitutes ‘significant’. I thought that it was much more likely to be a work of non-fiction rather than fiction – although I was prepared to agree that some fiction works are significant. I also thought that the significant books would have had to stand the test of time. It’s easy to see a book as a flash in the pan significance wise but 5, 10 or 50 years later being completely forgotten and unknown. Obvious significant books are those of which the major religions base their beliefs – though I have no great desire or intention to read them. Others are the great works of philosophy which I intend to get around to eventually. Then there’s the great political works which I will try to read, master and understand. After that I guess that there are the cultural greats many of which I’d probably heard about before but never really dreamt of trying until now.
So why the failure? Well, I had hoped to read at least a few significant books to get things rolling in 2014. Sad to say this didn’t exactly get off the ground with any great style or grace. The only definite significant read of 2014 was:
The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli (FP: 1531/32)
As significance goes that’s pretty high up the chart so I’m happy with that. Unfortunately that was pretty much it as far as I was concerned. The only other two possible examples, or more likely significant books in their respective fields are:
Ways of Seeing by John Berger (FP: 1972)
and
Design as Art by Bruno Munari (FP: 1966)
So not exactly knocking it out of the park in Year One. I think it’s safe to say that things can only get better. This year I’m aiming for at least three definite and any number of possible significant reads. I do have some on my shelves already. All that I need to do is ‘man up’ and take them off the shelves, open them and hopefully read them to the end. I guess it's thinking that they’ll be difficult and I’m approaching them from a position of working class ignorance that puts me off (of course ironically other people will probably think I’m showing off and flaunting my intellectualism). I’ve learnt over the past few years that the classics are nothing to be afraid of so I fully expect that the great works of non-fiction will, largely, be the same. It’s about time I found out.
4 comments:
It's good to have goals, that's the only way I ever get anything done. I need to read more. I tend to do three things with my time: work (both housework and school work), projects (home improvement is my addiction), and squandering my time (usually playing Scrabble or Spider Solitaire on my iPad). When I try to read, sometimes I'm easily distracted. I blame the book for not holding my attention. Or as is also often the case, I feel guilty for sitting still. There's always so much to do, sitting and reading tells me something more important isn't getting done. I need to find a balance, but I haven't figured out how to sit still for long.
v v said: When I try to read, sometimes I'm easily distracted. I blame the book for not holding my attention. Or as is also often the case, I feel guilty for sitting still.
Oh, you should never feel guilty for reading a book - any book. You may be physically sitting still but just imagine what your brain/mind is doing!
v v said: There's always so much to do, sitting and reading tells me something more important isn't getting done. I need to find a balance, but I haven't figured out how to sit still for long.
No matter what you do there's always more and then some more on top. You will never finish even if you had ten lifetimes. I'll probably never finish all of the books I own now - never mind the ones I keep buying (2 today plus an arrival from Amazon). I honestly find it very difficult to cope with life if I don't read something every day. If it wasn't books I's be reading road signs and cereal packets.... [grin]
Have you read The Origin of Species? A few years ago I had an interest in reading books that had changed history, but I never read many. I think "Origin of Species" and The Communist Manifesto were as far as I got! (I suppose I can include Common Sense now, though.)
I do have copies of The Origin of Species, The Communist Manifesto and Common Sense in my TBR pile so they should get read eventually. It's just getting over the 'fear' factor first! [that they'll be difficult to read]
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