Week 16 Prompt Response

"How have reading and books changed since you were a child, for you specifically?"

Reflecting on Reading and Me Me Me:

Eugen Spiro

During my childhood reading was an escape and a refuge and a venue for learning, and eventually an act of identity creation. In elementary school, I read voraciously about dinosaurs and went to church on Sundays with my grandfather and read the Bible. Later, in about third grade, I identified conflicting narratives and took the first steps to be an atheist. (Science won, but I still love a good story.) In fifth grade, I read A Wrinkle in Time and identified with Meg when I was bullied and lost my father to emphysema. 

Found on Pinterest

In the 90’s, I read Christopher Hitchens and learned how to view the world oppositionally and critically, to be assertive and confident to express opinions contradictory to received thought, to reject authority and mock sacred cows. (Like Mother Theresa, what a bish!) I got so good at this  in fact, later I concluded that half the time Hitchens was full of crap. 

Studying for a B.A. in women’s studies, I read bell hooks and understood the “oppositional gaze” as a feminist theoretical point of view, and to think critically. As an adult in the ten years it took me to get a B.A. and in graduate school (the first time), I learned how to read all over again, to analyze arguments, identify evidence, to evaluate the strength of non-fiction writing, and to deconstruct the form of a scholarly article. In a class on gender and children’s literature, I re-read A Wrinkle in Time and loved Meg all over again while at the same time thinking, “This is weird, all this Christian imagery, I didn’t notice it or understand it the first time!” and “This is an anti-communist allegory, cool!”. During this, my second stint in graduate school, I’ve rarely allowed time to myself for fiction reading. The work load plus the demands of motherhood didn’t permit my previous habits of staying up all night to read or laying for hours in bed of an afternoon reading. In the past three years I’ve spent at home, not working in a library, I’ve been unable to indulge my love of fiction. But with this class I not only allowed myself to read, it was homework! I've been able to tell my family, "Leave me alone, I HAVE to READ." I’ve spent hours, literally hours, sitting at the computer on Goodreads, going down the rabbit hole looking for reading recommendations for others and straying into tangential searches, excited to find new reads for myself. My online reading habits have changed, but not the obsessive reading itself. Since taking a break from idle time-wasting reading Facebook and arguing with relatives, I’ve become obsessed with reading Twitter, wasting time arguing with strangers. (Though according to Hitchens, time spent arguing is never wasted.) In the past few weeks Goodreads has become my safe space. One thing remains constant in the story of reading and me: I love it. 

"A Good Read" by Sally Strand

The above retrospective on my relationship with reading does not reflect the social elements of the act. (Except the online arguing and sharing.) As Ursula Le Guin (one of my favorite writers) observes, though reading is perceived as a solitary pastime, literacy was in the past, “an important social activity.” It was a shared experience. Certainly this is true in my own life, that “the shared experience of books was a genuine bond.” When I find someone who knows what a “kindred spirit” is, I know I’ve found a kindred spirit. When my neighbor with whom I am friendly but not close (despite our daughters spending all their free time together) revealed she and her husband love Game of Thrones, we found safe common ground. As someone who loves reading and forms strong opinions, some of my best memories of college involve classroom reading discussions and verbal scrapes defending my views on a particular reading. I’ll never forget “Saucer’s girlfriend” as she was known, though I have no idea who Saucer is or what her name was, only that my closest friends in that class and I bonded over our dislike of her referring to Saucer/Sosuer/Soshure constantly. Or is it Saucier? Who cares! (Social experiences of reading inspire faction formation, which is itself a form of bonding.) 

Clauida Tremblay

The Future of Reading

Speaking of my idol the late Le Guin, and in the spirit of Christopher Hitchens, I have to disagree with her when she argues reading is an active act, as opposed to watching television, which she characterizes as passive. Reading is absolutely active, but so can television viewing be active. I believe the same skills required to, “read a story well” can be applied to television viewing. (Ask any fan of LOST, Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones.) She says with television, “all you have to do is sit and stare” whereas with reading alertness is required. Perhaps the social aspect of reading during the period she describes as the “century of the book”, from 1850 until 1950, will in the future be identified with the modern golden age of television? Like Victorians who scrambled to received news about Dickens’ Little Nell, I was dying to find out about Jon Snow’s fate, and have spent hours discussing theories on who is the prince who was promised. In the future, someday, perhaps a pollster will complain that no one watches episodic television anymore? 

Publishing in the Future

My instinct is to say that I can't begin to speculate on the future of publishing, but a starting  place for any speculation is certainly Le Guin's point that, "the stupidity of the contemporary ,corporation-owned publishing company is fathomless: the think they can sell books as commodities." To them, the value of a book is based on its ability to sell or be sold, not its artistic value. To borrow from Le Guin's own oppositional historical interpretation on the history of reading, this is nothing new; I would argue this has always been true. Publishers , whether modern corporation or "old timey" fly by night booksellers are motivated mostly by profit.The Bronte's had to pay a disreputable publisher to see their books in print. Despite being some of the greatest works in the English language, the spinster sisters probably lucked out by dying from tuberculosis, because if they'd been forced to rely on the earnings from their work, they'd have starved to death. If anything, in the 21st century, critical accolades and the accompanying prestige and literary snobbery is a marketing angle, a selling point. It's like Oscar bait, but for books. Perhaps, a way around the publishing industry will be e-books? Self-publishing already provides opportunities for writers who might otherwise be marginalized. Online social-networks for writers allow authors and creators to magnify and promote one another. I only discovered Indigenous fiction authors recently by accident, by following on Twitter some interesting indigenous people online in reference to outrage at police violence against a young Native Wisconsin boy who was killed earlier this year. I can only say I hope this to be true, that creators will find an audience, and every book its reader, without the mediator of the profit motivated publishing industry.

Ultimately, as far as the future of reading and book publishing is concerned, I predict, plus les choses changent, plus elles restent les mêmes.  (The more things change the more they stay the same.)