100 Things #29: Reading.
Feb. 1st, 2013 09:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
railentheAppropriate that after my hiatus from writing and reading, I get right back into the spirit of things by doing a post on reading.
When I was a kid, I read before I could read. My mom and dad instilled a love of words into me (perhaps why I was always told I talk too much when I was growing up—I LOVED words). I’d pester them as they read their books and the newspaper (remember those?), constantly asking “What’s this word?” as they read to me. This is probably why, before I was old enough to be sent to school, they taught me how to write. I remember sitting at my little yellow table in the middle of the hallway, in front of Mom’s closet that we never really opened that much—I would later sneak in, find her old glamorous clothing from her model career—and I learned how to write my letters. That came AGONIZINGLY SLOWLY—the problem was, I was a born leftie and my mom was training me right-handed. (The relic persists in sports.)
But reading came fast.
Before I knew it I’d blown through all the stuff in my room and was looking for something more challenging to read, something bigger across than a piece of an inch.
This was why my dad spent a day plucking me off of progressively higher bookshelves in the house: Stephen King is not appropriate reading material for a five-year-old.
Weirder still, my favorite part of books was when you opened that new book for the first time—the faint creak in the spine, and that delicious, delicious new-book smell: like the faintest vanilla and some unknown, long gone spice. Before I began reading a book, I’d crack it open to the middle, where that smell was strongest, inhale deeply, then flip to the actual beginning of the book, that aroma still tickling my nostrils.
When we were allowed to order from the Scholastic Book Club in school, I remember wishing I was coordinated enough to do cartwheels around the house. While I LOVED my video games to death, my first love was reading, and so I picked out what I wanted to read and asked my parents “Can I can I can I please please PLEASE???” until they let me send in the form.
(I honestly don’t think they thought about it all that hard: I grew up in an area where it was a rare sight to find someone reading at their grade level, let alone above it as I did.)
Two weeks passed. I started to think that the books would never show up. Then, one day, I come home and there’s this…MOUNTAIN of books sitting on my bed. I squeal, run in to give my parents rib-crushing hugs—and then shut myself in my room to read.
Really, it’s a habit I haven’t broken. If I’ve bought a bunch of books—whether old-fashioned paper or new-fangled e-books—I basically hang a ‘do not disturb’ sign on all of my social outlets and dive into the book. If I’ve mentioned getting a new book, it’s almost useless trying to get my attention, because it’s going to be basically impossible to get my attention until I’m done reading. I’m a bookworm at heart, after all.
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Apologies for the not very articulate rant...
Date: 2013-02-02 05:21 am (UTC)I can read fast (though I have a terrible tendency to skim and miss out an important detail) but I have a terrible attention span. So if a book doesn't hold my interest it will take forever to get finished because I simply will not want to read it.
I loved reading...until school started interfering and telling me WHAT I should read and HOW I should read it. In year 1 (which is our equivalent of the first grade with 5-6 year olds) I went from being one of the bottom of the class when it came to reading (I was one of the youngest in the class due to being born only two months before the cut-off date for that class) to one of the top in the class of two weeks. How did this happen? I liked the look of the illustrations on the front covers of the books the top of the class members were reading (it had pictures of kids eating gingerbread men. I was less than 5 and a half and I thought primarily with my stomach. You do the math) so I upped my game to get them. But then a few years later the school starts saying that I should be reading Charles Dickens instead of Roald Dahl at that age. Now I think Charles Dickens is a great writer - when I read him of my own accord I loved his work - but as a 9 year old who likes fantastical and nightmarish concepts, classical literature from almost 200 years ago sounds as dull as ditchwater. I refused to play along and continued to read what I liked, which the school deemed far below my academic level and soon reading became tainted: it was no longer a fun pastime, it was all ACADEMIC. Apparently if you weren't reading a fancy book you were an idiot. Why? What was wrong with reading books you liked? I liked reading easily accessible books because they were effortless to get into and I enjoyed them! If a book doesn't hold your interest you shouldn't be forced to read it because you won't appreciate it.
I think this is why I am not a very literary person because I do not have much of an interest in books that are presented to me as articulate or sophisticated because my mind still associates that with school and...well we know I have an axe to grind in that department. (Though I don't actually have any beef with literature itself - I willingly took up English Literature as an A-Level and effectively enjoyed it plus I began to give old classics a chance as an adult and found I quite liked some of them - I just don't like being told I SHOULD read something because it makes me seem cleverer if I do.)
To this day one of my biggest pet peeves is the reading guidelines imposed on books. I don't think they should be there - children should be allowed to choose if they want to read the books or not. Yes, some books are very sophisticated and if a young mind takes them up then good on them but for the deep affection of excrement, DON'T TRY MAKING SOMEONE FEEL LIKE RUBBISH FOR READING SOMETHING SIMPLER. Reading should be a joy, not a chore.
ETA: ACK. Sorry if I made it sound like I was screaming at you - I was just ranting at the academic system. *bows head*
Re: Apologies for the not very articulate rant...
Date: 2013-02-02 11:33 am (UTC)I had a teacher who actually went around confiscating books she deemed inappropriate (including academically inappropriate) and forcing 19th C Lit down 12 year old children's throats. She was deeply unhappy when I defended the Earthsea Quartet (she banned fantasy as being 'too gory and bloody and full of death', and I argued with her that not all fantasy was like that - since she hadn't read any, she couldn't argue). I kept getting surprise book-checks after that.
As an English Lit major - I've found that what most schools prior to university deem 'suitable reading material' or 'sophisticated reading material' is... to put it the least, extremely narrow-minded. There's probably something to be made out of anything you like, if you can argue it.
Re: Apologies for the not very articulate rant...
Date: 2013-02-02 01:54 pm (UTC)Actually it's rather odd. I had enough educational strife thanks to the learning difficulties but I could read very well to the point that when I have to take Dyslexia assessments they always say "But you don't SEEM dyslexic! Your reading abilities are too good!" (My problems are more processing based - I need to be eased in to something very slowly in order to process it. Throw me in and you're going to get a lot of flailing and struggled attempts to stay afloat...)
I was very lucky to have good Eng Lit teachers from the age of 14-18 because they weren't the awful sneering pretentious types that made me want to literally throw the book at them. My English Lit AS and A level reading was a mixed bag (the poetry was awful - SO AWFUL I KEPT LOOKING WISTFULLY AT THE SHREDDER.) but the teachers were good so it wasn't a bad experience overall:
AS Level (High school equivalent of Junior year):
Hamlet (enjoyed it)
Collected poems by Gillian Clarke (a terrible welsh poet who I have nothing but contempt for and amusingly enough so did my teachers)
A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams (loved it)
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (Whoops - forgot I'd done that one ^^;;)
A Level (High school equivalent of Senior year):
Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood (meh)
Doctor Faustus (...um, barely remember it to be honest - much more fond of Shakespeare though one of my teachers was a Marlowe fanboy)
The Tempest (enjoyed it)
The Whitsun Weddings by Phillip Larkin (I admit I HATED Larkin. If I wanted to study the angry ramblings of an old git I'd listen to my father!)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee (loved it!)
We didn't have much to read because our schedules were so crammed and they'd rather we studied less materials and had a stronger knowledge of them than study more materials and have a weaker knowledge.
Re: Apologies for the not very articulate rant...
Date: 2013-02-02 02:31 pm (UTC)My boyfriend was involved in a performance of the aforementioned play - but the school had deemed it too long for the allotted time frame.
The solution? Abridge it.
Cue:
Marriage is but a ceremonial toy;
if thou lov'st me, think not on it
and everything else after it CUT.
Boyfriend (playing Faustus) stared at the guy playing Mephistophilis, and both burst out in hysterical laughter because neither of them actually expected to wind up with Mephistophilis/Faustus slash.
I AM SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG. MY LEG FELL OFF AGAIN.
Date: 2013-02-05 05:04 am (UTC)...to my surprise, that worked.
It might've been partly because I wasn't going to do it otherwise. Eventually they realized it was silly on their parts, because disobeying meant detention, and detention meant spending the afternoon in the library, and the library was my holy sanctuary.
There was only one thing I really HATED when I had to read it: The Great Gatsby. "A classic, a gem, a MASTERPIECE!" they said.
BORING, DULL, BORING.
The entire class thought so in varying degrees, but I was especially turned off by it--I can honestly say reading the ingredients on a bottle of soda pop was more interesting than that book.
Rai, if your leg falls off your only obligation is to try and regain health! D:
Date: 2013-02-05 01:06 pm (UTC)I probably should not admit this when I make an offer to volunteer at the special school my former dyslexia tutor runs, especially as I'm one of the success stories.I think when it comes to getting kids to read, the best thing to do is to try and help them find what they want to read. Make it fun, let 'em read things pertaining to their interests and help them when they struggle with words they don't understand.
Funny that you mention "The Great Gatsby"... my father keeps INSISTING that I read it. But it is an unfortunate truth that no matter how good a work is, it shall never please every palette. (Though the taste is always sweeter when found and bitterer when forced.) I might pick it up in due time and come to my own conclusion. And it further reminds me that when I have children I shall despair for odds are plenty of things I consider marvelous shall be nothing but the dullest entities to them. (My father has a far too zealous appreciation of Lorenz Hart's lyrics...I have far too zealous an appreciation of Akira Ishida's acting... woe betide my bloodline - we are cursed to become championing obsessives!
Though I actually quite like the lyrics of Lorenz Hart but I am not as pedantically convinced that he was the only good lyricist to ever work with Richard Rogers as my old man is.)no subject
Date: 2013-02-02 11:29 am (UTC)*high-fives
I still do that. /guilty
I was another read-so-many-books-as-a-kid-people-refused-to-believe-it case. I actually borrowed books from the school library on Monday - as many as I was allowed to - and returned them all on Friday. The librarian gave me a deeply suspicious stare and said "Girl, you're supposed to read them!"
Cue extremely loud and indignant protests of I DID READ THEM YOU CAN QUIZ ME IF YOU LIKE.
I was about ten at this time.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-05 05:10 am (UTC)Neither rain nor sleet nor high water will keep us away from delicious
cakewords.OMG the new book smell. If they bottled it I'd buy a lifetime supply.