- the writer, who took ideas swirling around in their head, depositing them in the book
- the reader, who lifts them off of the page and up into the air, interpreting their vision of what the author is describing
This is real work. It is why a person reading the cheesiest novel is doing something more rewarding than sitting and watching television, the television delivering prepackaged images straight into their cerebral cortex. And for some books, the difficult books, the challenge of understanding them and seeing their world is especially daunting.
Shakespeare. Virginia Woolf. James Joyce. All of these authors are regarded as difficult reads and indeed, they do present significant challenges. They also present some of the richest and most brilliant statements ever made in literature. How does a reader get from the point where they're facing an imposing page of text to the point where they are tapping into its brilliant insights and images?
By any means necessary.
There is no cheating here. There is no need to avoid a work which both attracts and intimidates you. Nothing that helps you get a foothold in such a work is out of bounds. Any understanding that you gain, any enrichment of your life from understanding this material is GOOD.
There are so many tools to consider using here:
- a college class that you attend in person
- classes taught via audiobooks, including The Great Courses. Peter Saccio's courses on Shakespeare are brilliant and make it abundantly clear what a field for study Shakespeare's plays are
- audiobooks in which the book is narrated. For the James Joyce book Ulysses, hearing it narrated opened it up to understanding and enjoyment
- reading critical opinions about great literature can reveal aspects of the work that you might not have thought of, on your own.
There is NO need to think that any book is a mountain that you must either climb solo, without any gear or consider yourself a failure. Mountain climbers use equipment devised and made by scores of other people and start out following routes established by those who went before them. And if they don't let that hold then back from continuing to climb, it means that they can eventually be pathfinders, in their own right.
Learn to be a pathfinder in the great cultural conversation: read the great books!
There are so many tools to consider using here:
- a college class that you attend in person
- classes taught via audiobooks, including The Great Courses. Peter Saccio's courses on Shakespeare are brilliant and make it abundantly clear what a field for study Shakespeare's plays are
- audiobooks in which the book is narrated. For the James Joyce book Ulysses, hearing it narrated opened it up to understanding and enjoyment
- reading critical opinions about great literature can reveal aspects of the work that you might not have thought of, on your own.
There is NO need to think that any book is a mountain that you must either climb solo, without any gear or consider yourself a failure. Mountain climbers use equipment devised and made by scores of other people and start out following routes established by those who went before them. And if they don't let that hold then back from continuing to climb, it means that they can eventually be pathfinders, in their own right.
Learn to be a pathfinder in the great cultural conversation: read the great books!
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