Boxall's 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die discussion
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Nicholas, interesting question, and I don't know who is qualified to answer it as I cannot see how our moderators or goodreads could have access to such data.As a long time member of the group (2007), I'd say there is a broad range of age groups represented here. I've certainly known of other young people like yourself as well as people in their 20's 30's, 40's, 50's and 60's. There are professional writers and English/Language Arts teachers and professors represented...perhaps even a literary critic or two!
But most of the membership I believe are just avid readers who are up for a challenge to read broadly, critically and constantly! I'd love to see other members responses to your question, and I do hope some of them post here as well.
There is a thread here on strategies members use to tackle the lists. Be sure to check that out, Nicholas, and good luck!
I'm 21 :)so i'm quite young, i hope that i'll be able to read 90% by the time i get to 40! I don't have any "strategies" tho, i just pick a book and read!
I'm 21 too : ) I haven't started yet but just ordered the book off amazon.
I plan to read books not on the list as well so no real strategy.
x
Also, if you have a kindle you can download loads of the classics for free! I've managed to download 93 books from the list without paying a penny & I'm sure there's loads more too x
I'm 28. I've only been aware of the list for a couple of years, but I've been reading classics since I was in middle school. Just a book nerd, I guess. :) I don't really have a strategy, just an intense love for reading books that are worth reading.
Nicolas, I am 29, and just found out about the list a month ago. My personal goal is to complete 500 of the books before I hit 40, which seems doable as long as I stay pretty focused :) I had about 100 under my belt already, so now I am picking through and finding what I will most enjoy. It's a nice project, but for me, the goal is to enjoy my time reading and increase my overall base of knowledge in literature. But, I still read new books, books that aren't on the list, and really terrible mystery novels. So maybe I'll have to push my goal back to 500 by 50, haha. As long as I keep reading, it doesn't really matter.
I'm 25, and I've known about the list for a while now. I haven't been reading from it exclusively because there are far too many books that I want to read in general, but this past year or so I've kept a book from the list on loan from the library and been alternating them with my other reading. I prefer to go through the list in largely chronological order, since I feel like it gives me a better context for the books that came later. But some of the ancient Greek texts have been...difficult to come by (at least in translation). And I can't read ancient Greek. :)
I'm 36 and discovered the list 5 years ago. I'm at 16% of the original list and 14% of the combined, I believe. I'm trying to read authors who have multiple entries on the list and at least read one. Other than that, I belong to a book trading website and it's often random which book I get next. I pick whatever appeals at the moment!
While I won't give my age, I'll tell you that my younger daughter is the same age as Manda. ;-) I do use my Kindle, and I find myself using my library more and more, including inter-library loan. I don't expect to live to finish the list, which frees me to read only those titles of interest to me. Still, that's a lot of titles, and hope to get to all of those.
I have no problems giving my age :) I'm 46, & have been reading anything & everything since I was a kid. I've been going back & reading classics during my oldest 3 kids' journeys through high school that I didn't read when I was in high school, because we had a different curriculum. My 5 kids are 25, almost 23, 20, 15, & 13. Of those 5, my biggest readers are the 25 year old, although now that she's the mother of a 2 year old herself, she doesn't find much time, my 20 year old daughter, & my 13 year old son. I'm also not going to live to complete the list in all of it's variations, but there are still so many on my want to read list that it'll keep me busy till my eyes fall out! LOL
I'm 25. I started reading off the list in December 2010. A lot of what I read is dependant on what books I pick up in charity shops and given to me by friends. I found however, that when I found an author I liked, I then chased down more of their books (did this with Tolstoy, Jeanette Winterson, Margaret Atwood etc). To ensure I don't OD on good authors and continue to be introduced to new ones, I set myself the challenge this year of only reading books off the list by authors I hadn't tried yet. So far, so good! Means you have to keep a keen eye out! Also, some people try and mix it up with a classic followed by a modern etc.
Have fun!
http://bookbebeautiful.blogspot.com.au/
I'm 45 and have been reading some of the list books for a little over 12 months now. I aim to read at least one or two list books per month, along with others. Hoping I still have my eyesight when I'm 100 ...
I'm 32. I've been "working" on the 2006 list for about two years, but only in the last couple of months have I started reading with any kind of strategy. I'm currently reading the books from 2000-2006, and then plan on reading 1900-1909. I'm at 178 so far and I'm hoping to hit 200 by the end of the year.
Kai wrote: "I'm 32. I've been "working" on the 2006 list for about two years, but only in the last couple of months have I started reading with any kind of strategy. I'm currently reading the books from 2000..."Good strategy
Mod
I'm 23. I am doing much better with the 1001 Movies list...saw about 425-450, whereas I haven't even gotten to 100 on 1001 Books! It's an ambitious list...we will see how it goes, but I'm looking forward to reading some great books. :)
Very interesting thread! I'm 39 and just discovered the list last month. I had "accidentally" read 192 of them already, so that's a plus I guess. I don't have much of a strategy. I just try to intersperse the books from this list from my other reads.
Caroline wrote: "I'm 23. I am doing much better with the 1001 Movies list...saw about 425-450, whereas I haven't even gotten to 100 on 1001 Books! It's an ambitious list...we will see how it goes, but I'm looking..."OOO where did you get the 1001 movies list?
I'm 28 and I've been working on the list for a couple of years now, plus what I read as an english major in college. my strategy is that I have all the books loaded on to good reads in a seperate to read bookshelf and when i get bored, I pick a spot in the list at random and read the descriptions of the books, pushing the ones I'm more interested in towards the top of the list and the ones I'm not interested in to the bottom. Then when I need a new book, I look at the top few on the list and choose between them.
I also keep all the other books I want to read on a seperate list and intermix them when I need something a little lighter.
I'm 30 and have been on the list for about 2 1/2 years now although I have had it for much longer. I'm not planning on reading all of them because let's face it not all of those books appeal to me. I tried at first to do them all (the 2006 version) in alphabetical order and when I got a few right off the bat that were not my cup of tea, I decided to re-evaluate. It has broadened my literary horizons, however.
Starburn wrote: "Caroline wrote: "I'm 23. I am doing much better with the 1001 Movies list...saw about 425-450, whereas I haven't even gotten to 100 on 1001 Books! It's an ambitious list...we will see how it goes..."It's a book just like 1001 Books, but the list is online at iCheckMovies.com as well. They update it pretty frequently there -- it's a lot of fun! :)
I'm 32 I've been reading from the list for about 3 years now but I read lots of non-list books too. I pick books up via bookcrossing and local charity book shops. No real strategy at the moment as I am working full timr teaching and then studying for a Masters part time so my reading time is pretty slim.
Caroline wrote: "Starburn wrote: "Caroline wrote: "I'm 23. I am doing much better with the 1001 Movies list...saw about 425-450, whereas I haven't even gotten to 100 on 1001 Books! It's an ambitious list...we wil..."That's great! I'll have to check how many I've already seen.
I'm 25 and have been keeping track of my progress since the first edition of the list came out.In terms of tactics I have manipulated my stats further to identify target areas and set smaller goals. For example, a few years ago I broke down the list into centuries which highlighted the fact I hadn't yet read anything from the pre-1700s section of the list. So I decided to get myself to 10% read for each of the centuries.
Lately I have been looking at how many books each author has on the list. There are currently 18 authors with 5 or more books on the list that I haven't read anything of, so I am chipping away at getting these all up to at least one read.
Given this has grown to the 1305 Books You Must Read Before You Die it's nice to have smaller milestones to check off along the way!
Tanya wrote: "In terms of tactics... Lately I have been looking at how many books each author has on the list. There are currently 18 authors with 5 or more books on the list that I haven't read anything of, so I am chipping away at getting these all up to at least one read."
Hmmmm... I've concentrated off and on with "most-listed" authors, and also picked 5 or more as the benchmark to draw my attention. But I came up with 42 authors with 5 or more on any-and-all of the list editions.
Love your smaller milestones tactics!
I should have gotten your list of 42, Stephanie. I came up with 38, though I didn't include Proust and Powell with their multi-volume single entry.Anyway, the strategy of reading at least one of these perhaps over-represented authors seems a good strategy for inching up personal numbers.
Hmmm I come to 41... I wonder where we are all different? (The 18 is just the authors with five or more I haven't yet read any from).
Tanya wrote: "Hmmm I come to 41... I wonder where we are all different? (The 18 is just the authors with five or more I haven't yet read any from)."It's always possible I overlooked some - I was visibly scanning the group bookshelves, not the spreadsheet.
As a younger reader (18), it would be cool to discover some tactics to reading the list from some more mature reader's also.
:)