fiction files redux discussion
Different Perspectives - Re-reading Books
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Catcher is quite a different book this time around. The first time around I was busy trying to figure out what was going on, and relating to Holden's everyone's-a-phony thing. The whole brother dying trauma thing didn't connect for me quite as much.
This time I was reading it more for the writing itself and the family drama side of it - how we are drawn into his world, not whether or not I bought into the vision.
I read Franny & Zooey right before and think it's a far superior work, actually.
Who was it that told me Salinger has been writing all this time and hiding it from the world. I forget.
I read Lolita for the first time when I was in college. It was an academic exercise in puzzle solving for me at the time. I remember being repulsed by the idea but no strong visceral reaction, really.
This time around, I have a daughter who is 10. Some of the passages were nauseating. But I also read it for the skill of the art itself. It is such a tightly woven tale.
These days, when I revisit a book -- and when I read it for the first time -- one of the major things I'm looking for is craft, particularly if the book was recommended by someone I respect. That's why my to-read shelf reads like a list of what people here are reading. It is a list of what people in our group read.
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I love that book.
So far I think that the main difference is that I'm picking up more on the social issues in the book.
I mean, I understood the sexual politics, the xenophobia, the drug addiction, the fall of the Western Empire stuff when I was in college the first time around.
But I don't think I understood what I know from the first chapter -- Jonathan Harker, in what appears to be a feeble-minded submissiveness to his circumstances, actually represents the naivete of the scientific method. Of Western reliance on "observation" and the dismissal of "superstition." The deliberate turning away from the magical, the superstitious.
He only believes what he observes and even then doesn't have much to say about that, other than he has a strong sense of foreboding.
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When I was 16, THE GREAT GATSBY was an absolute bore. I thought my English teacher was an idiot for thinking it was so great.I picked it up again when I was about 32. As a recently married guy with a child and a mortgage and a begrudging acceptance of my "career" as an advertising writer -- oh, the book resonated with me quite a bit. (The narrator, Nick, turns 30 during the course of the story, and has a flashback toward the end that implies, for him, the death of his youth.)
Now closer to 40, I wonder how those characters might've ended up ten years later (other than Gatsby and Myrtle, obviously). Anyone up for taking a crack at THE GREAT GATSBY II?
Anyway...
Related question: Why do so many high-school English programs make GATSBY required reading? The story is almost completely irrelevant to the teenage worldview. Isn't a big part of the job getting kids to actually ENJOY reading?
-G
Not nearly enough time to write about this topic with all the wit and passion it deserves, but this has happened for me with Pride & Prejudice oh-so-often! My first reading almost about six years ago left me bored - I know, who could possibly be bored by Austen who is so clever and funny, but I was. I just didn't give it enough of my world to care. And I suffered for it. I don't recall being in a relationship at the time, so this might be why. Then I watched the 2006 (?) movie and didn't like it and for some reason decided to try again... Who knows what prompted that decision! And I loved it!!!Everything was there and I fell hard. But I couldn't see why every girl is so enamored with Darcy. He was rude and snobbish - HE WAS A PRIG!!! Why do we love him? So I watched the movie again, and I saw it. He is none of these things. He is shy or socially inept, but not so bad as that. And he is fiercely loyal and a dear friend, and I wanted to be in a relationship with someone who had that kind of depth and chivalry. In fact, I was swept away.
I was not in a relationship but I promised myself the kind of relationship I felt I deserved. And then I met Dennis and I got EXACTLY what I asked for - the good and the bad.
And when I re-read it again in the throes of our relationship I felt happy and safe, like the novel was my beacon - a pillar of light for me. And I feel that way even now, as I re-watch the film. It was like coming home after a long absence.
I wonder what the next reading will impart on me.
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On the topic of Austen, I re-read Northanger Abbey last year and had a completely different reaction to it than the first time I read it! When I got on my Jane Austen kick in my early 20s I read all her work and Northanger Abbey struck me as rather silly, almost as a "lesser" work. But reading it now as a GROWN WOMAN I was surprised by how clever it is! The way Jane portrays the Isabella Thorpe character is such biting satire on both friendships between women and courtship rituals. It's VERY saucy! And oh my, isn't Henry Tilney just dreamy?? I'd take Tilney over Darcy any day!
Northanger Abbey is my favourite of Austen's works (but I only started reading her around 5 years ago or so... I'm a late bloomer :). I also thought it was funny, but try as I might I couldn't get through "The Mysteries of Udolpho." I will probably attempt another reading of it someday though...
Speaking of gothic novels (I sense another thread will come of this), would anyone else be interested in reading some and having a thread on it? I just finished Jane Eyre <3 and would love to have a chat about it and others of its like.
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When I was 28, I got one of those Easton Press editions of Moby-Dick--the giant leather-bound editions with gold-edged pages and illustrations--for about $5. It was such a beautiful edition that I decided to re-read the novel. Pretty soon I was besotted. There are all these intricate digressions that go off on quirky little paths, and Ishmael relates every effing thing to whales. I mean, my God. It's brilliant.
My ardor has cooled a bit, but I still love Moby-Dick. And part of the reason I love it is that I was forced to read it in high school. Otherwise I would have been a lot less likely to read it later in life.
Being an English department chair, I think many high school English programs still assign classics like Gatsby because they want to expose students to some great works. There are other reasons, too--thematic/historical (if you're gonna teach American Lit, it's kind of hard not to teach Gatsby), familiarity ("I've taught it since '72 and it was fine then and it's fine now"), brevity and complexity (lot easier to teach Gatsby than, say, The Sound and the Fury).
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You know what? After reading Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates I was shocked that I hadn't been made to read it in high school. It seems perfect high school English fodder.
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I'm torn about Revolutionary Road--some people rave about it but it sounds like such a downer.
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And it could take place anytime, anywhere. I was impressed by the movie version, actually, which surprised me.
I actually think that it would be something high school kids could really connect with, maybe even as much as I did to Camus in high school. One of those really powerful books you connect to your own life for about 1/2 way through it... until you realize it's not about you. But by then it's too late. You're already neck deep in the feelings... and by the end you realize... this can happen any time, any where.
Alienation from our fellow people is kinda ever-present as a theme.
Spacks spent a year revisiting novels she had read at different stages of her life, whether for pleasure or from obligation. Most had been enjoyable the first time through; a few of them were things she'd reread often over the years. Her report on this experiment might be called a critical memoir, or memoiristic criticism perhaps."Reading a book, or rereading it," she says, "we enter into relation not only with the text but with an imagined author. Rereading it, we relate also to one or more versions of our past selves. Examining the textures of those relationships, we learn both about ourselves and about complicated connections informing the mysterious process of reading."
Complete (and quite interesting) essay here: http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2...
Thoughts?
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To respond to Jimmy's post:
Scott McLemee, the author of the review on Spack puts it baldly:
"A book remains the same through time, but the context and personality of the reader don’t."
i can't see a cogent argument against that, and it summarizes nicely part of what spack is saying. i do a lot of re-reading of the books i enjoy. and it is true that sometimes there is that joy of noticing things i didn't notice before, or seeing an intertextuality i didn't before because i'd read more books since first reading. quite often it feels rather more like a regular visit with an old and dependable friend, who gets me, and can always provide me with the same experience that i had before. i just re-read the chill by ross macdonald and i don't believe i reacted any differently to it, than i did formerly. it may be i am unconscious of a variation in my reaction, but i don't think so. i re-read it purposely because it was reliable because i was sure that the experience would meet my expectations of it, and i wasn't disappointed.
that said, i've read pride & prejudice so many times i've lost count. if i had to approximate, at least twenty times since i was fourteen years old. every time i read it, i mark the same feelings at the same points: the embarrassment on behalf of elizabeth at the netherfied ball, and then my unabashed joy, complete with squeaking at its end. it feels to me like the exact same experience i had when i was fourteen years old. and yet, it is no longer my favourite jane austen novel. persuasion is, because as i've grown older, i feel the story of ann eliot, an older heroine with a life less idyllic than elizabeth's (despite ann's elevated rank in society -- in fact less idyllic because of it) resonates more with me, and my expectations of the world, and this could possibly be coloured by my perception that austen "the imagined author" as a writer has matured (there are twenty years between the time she begins pride & prejudice and the completion of persuasion in 1816), that now her love stories are coloured by her own experience.
all this to say that i don't know that my experience of the book has changed on these re-reads, but rather my context and perception of my current self, which ties in nicely with the quote you placed above. i don't know if it evokes my past self. as i stated, pride & prejudice remains the same reading experience for me, all the way up to the end. but when i close the cover i don't yearn for elizabeth's life as i did.
i would like to propose that the length of time elapsing between re-reading would also have an impact on my reaction to a book. if i go back to my old friend analogy: if i see that old friend every month, i'd be less likely to notice the passage of time on her face than if i were to meet up with that same person in lengthier increments, my memory more fixed than fluid not renewing that familiarity segmenting my memory of my experience of her, so only specific moments in time stand out. i think the same would holds true for books. when i was re-reading john wyndham novels a couple of years ago, i remembered the extra toe of a character in the chrysalis vividly, but the rest of the book was dim, and on occasions i know i thought, "oh! i remember this now" but i don't feel i got any more or less out of it on the re-read. i just reminded myself of the experience.
so that's a lot of words. i think i do have a point in there somewhere. :)
i'm not sure i buy this idea that: "[w]illingness to yield oneself to the text in a way impossible the first time through is, I think, the crucial element in rereading..." -- i think i'm arguing against that throughout this diatribe. nor do i believe that everyone embarks on a relationship with the "imagined author". i realize my points above suggest *i* do, and i believe i do. but i believe i have an over-sensitivity to voice to begin with. it's why i feel antipathy toward authors like atwood, or franzen who have written books i dislike. but i think other people do better jobs of keeping the authors out of it. :)
also, the previous comments seem quite relevant. and a lot more succinct :P but also looking through them makes me think i didn't respond to this thread before, though i remember reading through it because i couldn't recall a time when re-reading changed my opinion of the book itself but only my taste for it. and now i am also worried i might be accused of kugelmass disassociative disorder. :)
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Mo, a long rambling post is the best kind of post. I love that you write exactly how you talk!
I completely agree with you too that sometimes I reread a beloved novel because it is like going home, it's the same, it's a comfort. There is no expectation of altered feelings or maturity or time having passed. Although I do admit that when I reread The Outsiders, which I do about once every other year or so, I find that it immediately makes me feel twelve years old again. It evokes in me all the twelve year old dreamy feelings I had when I first read it and reread it back to back over a weekend in the summer. So I guess I do enter in a relationship with my past self. But I don't think I do that with every book I reread. And I am not one of those readers that enters into any kind of relationship with the "imagined author." I just don't read that way.
Anyway, it's all very interesting to think about and the next time I reread something I'll try to analyze my feeling a bit more...just for fun!
I rarely re-read although I think the experience would be highly rewarding and pleasurable... I just can't bring myself to read a book I've already read when there are hundreds of books still on my to-read list... I just can't! There's not enough time! I'm gonna die soon and I got to get it all in!
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I KNOW, right??? I agree with you. But sometimes I just get in a mood and want what I want.
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speaking of which, i think re-reading has a lot to do with memory and its idiosyncratic set-up in each of us -- that the kind of memory you have determines whether you are much of a re-reader.
jimmy, you haven't said whether you recall much of books once you have read them, and it sounds like you don't feel an urge to go back, in the same way that kerry and i have expressed. that you say "highly rewarding" makes me wonder whether you agree or disagree with the point about willingness/openness to the work on first reading that makes a re-reading a deeper experience that spack makes. :)
i absolutely understand about lack of time for re-reads. i usually don't do them unless i crave them, or if i need them to re-boot (usually because a) i've read a lot of dull or bad books in a row, or because i'm not able to get into a proper reading groove, and am trying to kick-start or b) i re-read because i want to quote something, and can't remember it properly, and then decide to re-read the whole thing while i'm there. :)
I'm awful at recall. I usually forget everything about a book (except the general feeling of it) within a year or two. Actually, that is the reason I joined Goodreads to begin with, I needed a place to jot down notes about what I read so I wouldn't forget so quickly.
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interesting, jimmy. so for you, there's a question of reading and memory as well except in your case, it's not about the re-read, but the note-taking. :)
at this point, i'm ready to throw spack's whole notion of not being open on first read out the window.
it IS about re-reading, if I had time. but lacking that, my notes will have to do... but notes are tricky too... they remind you only of what you thought upon first reading instead of letting you re-evaluate the source material with an open mind.
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hmmm. then it appears you are very much in agreement with spack's findings and that, were it not for your kinship with bemis you would approach reading in the same way she does. i am still throwing the 'not being open' out the window, for myself. :)
i just remembered that sometimes when i really like a book, i'll re-read it immediately because i want to experience it again.
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Didn't you do that with Elegance of the Hedgehog?
The only book I re-read immediately was The Outsiders when I was twelve! Isn't that funny??
But I often immediately re-watch a film I really like. Although, of course, a film takes less time to re-watch than a book does to re-read.
(Random: speaking of hedgehogs, Mick got a hedgehog shaped toy for Christmas and it is officially her favorite thing ever.)
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the outsiders thing makes complete sense, don't you think? :)
you bring up an interesting point: are the re-readers also the re-viewers? i'd imagine that same urgency around time would be a factor and the level of interest in books or cinema. :)
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Maureen wrote: "you bring up an interesting point: are the re-readers also the re-viewers? i'd imagine that same urgency around time would be a factor and the level of interest in books or cinema. :)" Mo - I don't know about the rest of the world, but I am definitely a HUGE re-viewer (I recently watched L'Ventura for the first time and immediately watched it all over again a second time). This year I went to the cinema three time for three different movies and ended up seeing each of them at least twice in theatres because I enjoyed them so much! While I like to re-read and have done so with a few selective books, I know my tendency to re-watch something goes far beyond my re-reading levels.
I think this is because I am a visual learner and if a book is special and has a visual memory or context for me I am more likely to re-read it.
Kerry - I sometimes share that guilt as well, but over the years it has haunted me less because I am realizing that my love of re-viewing something enables me to see it from various perspectives, which is ultimately why I want to read something new in the first place - usually. Unless it is a video game. Then I feel guilty as hell.
It only takes around 2 hours to re-view a movie... books usually take longer.
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i mean, i've probably watched star wars at least 25 times. i used to watch every episode of the x-files three, if not four times (when it aired, afterward with my x-files friend, x-files drinking game night...)so time watching x number of times watched might exceed time reading x number of times read. and it does also depend on the book. :)
i had a friend who was a big movie buff and then stopped watching movies because it was "a waste of time." i found this attitude annoying because you could ostensibly say that about a lot of things we do to relax, or blow off steam or to help others. lord knows i spent an hour yesterday helping somebody prepare for a job interview and that won't benefit me one little bit. i think ultimately it's a matter of choices, right? so if you liked a movie so much you want to see it again, right away? i say do it. if you're anxious that you're going to miss out on a lot of excellent literature, by all means, forge forth!
post script: the friend eventually starting watching movies again, so obviously realized that there are all kinds of ways to waste time.
(btw, i am tempted to re-read something right now because while i've read some interesting books lately, and some instructive ones, i haven't adored anything at all recently. i'm forcing myself through a collection of ronald firbank novels right now. i wanted so much to like it but i'm finding it really hard. 68 pages in into 200 of "vainglory" and i have no idea if there's ever going to be a story or a protagonist ever, and i'm pretty sure i'm never going to care about one of these stupid people. all the reviews are glowing, so maybe the two following books are better... again, i might learn something, but i'd like to adore something right now... )
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p.s. jimmy! a lovely goodreads friend of mine ended up reading spacks book recently and found that she wanted to re-read some books after finishing that one. i was tempted to quote from her review but instead i will just sneak in a link here: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
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http://paperpools.blogspot.ca/2012/03...
Thanks for the link. She certainly re-reads a lot. I prefer to live with vague/inaccurate but happy memories. ;)
Also, kind of unrelated, but I was digging around more on her blog and found this little thing about Goodreads & stats: http://paperpools.blogspot.ca/2012/02...
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http://paperpools.blogspot.ca/2012/02..."
very intriguing. i actually am cursing the additional time suck finding her blog is going to create in my life. :) and to keep us on topic: no doubt i will be re-reading it often. :P
Kerry wrote: "I know there are people out there that absolutely will not watch a movie more than once, but I will re-watch the same movie a gajillion times if I truly love it. And the same way I sometimes feel g..."From my own habits, I have found that what I can watch over and over are comedies (like the Christopher Guest movies or Arrested Development) and music-driven programs (like the T.A.M.I. Show). It's not often I can watch a mystery twice since I can't make myself forget how it ends, and emotional dramas that I dearly love don't always inspire me to a second viewing.
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Rereading: authors reveal their literary addictions"
i've missed you jimmy! what an assortment of authorial opinions! i took a quick glance over the article because i've got limited time on this lunch hour, but it makes me smile that people seem either to be in the "not enough time to re-read" camp or really believe in their ability to gain more from novles on the re-read as suggested by the spack article. i suspect never the twain shall meet.
i do like the fact that of the re-readers, several have attempted to understand what makes the great gatsby so great, but cannot quite fathom it...
I've read the Great Gatsby twice, and wasn't impressed either time. The reason I re-read it (with many years in between) was because I needed to know if I was missing something. I don't think I am. I think it just isn't that great of a novel.
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oh jimmy. you are always provocative. i love gatsby without reserve, but again, really shouldn't devote too much time right now to why... but perhaps i don't need to since i like what banville said in the article you posted:
"Fitzgerald was forever the inspired amateur, and Gatsby has all the tremulousness and delicacy of a masterpiece made against the odds. He managed it once and never again – but what an achievement it is, a kind of miracle, ever fresh, ever new, no matter how many times one ventures back into its sad, soiled and enchanted world."
i don't know that that's you missing something so much as maybe it's just not to your taste. lord knows when you were talking about thomas bernhard you talked me in and rather quickly out of thomas bernhard.
i'm trying to remember if there's a thread specific to gatsby anywhere around here. it's really a shame we couldn't bring our whole back list of postings from myspace when we moved...
HAHAHA yeah, Gatsby is definitely not to my taste. I don't think it's awful, but it hardly made an impression on me. Plus, the whole plot revolves around a chance-encounter (the whole car thing towards the end) which is too neat and tidy for me. What Banville said doesn't register to me, it's just words, he doesn't provide specific undeniable examples/evidence as to its greatness. Anyway, this isn't a Gatsby thread, so maybe we should just agree to disagree ;)Also, did you ever give Bernhard a chance? Or did I talk you out of it?
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you did talk me out of it though sometimes i am still tempted to try anyway. i saw one of his in the strand last year, with a friend who shall remain nameless.. i picked it up and showed him. he'd read it, of course, and he quickly shook his head, which meant, "no. it's not for you." and since he's usually spot-on with what i like i sheepishly put it down again. :)
and yeah, i won't get into the gatsby talk here but i will say banville's quote speaks to the emotional resonance of the story for me. i love jay gatz's list. i'm never going to get over the list. :)
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It's a feature. I'm guessing that books, historically, are meant to be reread. The prohibitive cost of books as the novel evolved leant itself as a form of entertainment meant to be re-enjoyed and re-explored.
It wasn't so easy to move on to another book, let alone to another form of entertainment, in one's home prior to the late 1800s-ish. I think that is why we often find novels, especially classics, so full and enriching.
That being said I don't reread nearly as much as I would like but perhaps I'll change that. I also find that the more I reread a book the harder time I have of pinning down what I like about a book. I've read Gatsby and The Sun Also Rises numerous times and love them. I just don't know why exactly.
I just started rereading Infinite Jest and I am finding it so much more wonderful than I remembered.
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I just re-read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte and was quite surprised by my reaction to it.
I remember reading it for the first time when I was in my late teens. At that time I was mired in the throes of my first real relationship with the boy who was my first love and I absolutely adored the book. I remember that I couldn’t put it down and the romance between Jane and Rochester swept me away with its passion and devotion.
This time around? Not so much. Reading it now as a thirty something adult in an eight year old relationship with her second love, I find that I didn’t adore it as much as I did then. This time around the opening chapters that describe Jane’s young life were a bit of a slog. Once Jane is at Thornfield, I was annoyed with how quickly she fell for Rochester and even a little confused as to why she fell for him. To be honest, he’s kind of a jerk! And then the last third of the book, when she is with the Rivers family, just drags on and on and when she inherits the money I kind of wish she would take it and run! Don’t marry Rivers or go back to Rochester, just make a fresh start – travel, explore, be your own person Jane!
It is a beautifully written book. I love the gothic romance of it, the mystery surrounding Grace Poole and the odd things that happen in the middle of the night. I just find that reading it as an adult I did not idealize the central love story the way I did when I was a teenager.
This got me thinking about re-reading books. I kind of love the idea of seeing a book with an entirely different perspective when you read it at different stages of life.
Has this happened to you? Did you love something when you read it as a teenager and hate it as an adult? Or vice versa? Has re-reading a book when you were married as opposed to single affect how you felt about it? What about before you were a parent and after? There are so many things that happen in our lives that affect our perspectives. It's bound to affect our re-reading perspectives.
Please share your experience!