Re-reading books

So, I've been enjoying going through the expanded edition of LETTERS of JRRT. 

One passage that made me really realize how different the experience of reading differs from reader to reader came in a letter from Tolkien to a reader (11 April 1956; LETTERS page 359).  Tolkien writes (emphasis mine):

. . . I am a very 'unvoracious' reader, 

and since I can seldom bring myself

 to read a work twice I think of the 

many things that I read -- too soon! --

Nothing, not even a (possible) deeper 

appreciation,  for me replaces the bloom 

on a book, the freshness of the unread.

 Still what we read and when goes, 

like the people we meet, by fate   

This made me realize who different JRRT's experience is from my own. If I like a book, I will read it again, sometimes repeatedly. Such was the case with WATERSHIP DOWN, FACE IN THE FROST, THE BOOKS OF WONDER, PERSUASION, of course Tolkien, and many another. I don't do it as much anymore, but that's largely because my eyesight is worse and partly because I now have more books available.

It's interesting to note that this is one of the many ways in which Tolkien and Lewis differed. Lewis loved to reread old favorites, and counted occasions when his doctor ordered a few days of bed rest one of life's not so little gifts. This was a trait he shared with his brother Warnie, who from time to time notes in his diary about re-reading specific books.

As for THE HOBBIT and LORD OF THE RINGS: by this point I have no idea how many times I've read both. I'm always reading them, in a sense.

--John R.

Currrent Reading:

TALKING TO DRAGONS by Patricia Wrede (the sixth time I've read it, according to my notes).

THE WIFE SAYS:

Lucky for Tolkien that his fans didn't feel the same way.