It’s the middle of August and things are looking pretty good for the 50 Book Challenge. In that I’m reading my 38th book and it’s still summer, technically, at least. Of course, there are minor issues to tie up, not least the fact that I’ve still got half of book 34, Don Quixote, to go – and that’s quite a substantial bit of reading. But generally speaking I feel quite optimistic and it is always a boost when it looks like you are going to hit a target.
But now insidious questions have started to creep in about what I’m reading. The rules of the challenge are pretty flexible. I, for instance, am perfectly happy counting both re-reads and graphic novels although it turns out that I haven’t done too many of either. But it turns out that easily my favourite kind of book is the crime novel or thriller that can be turned around in approximately 48 hours, contains a good bit of action and a nice, intellectually-satisfying puzzle to solve.
So, this is evidently what I enjoy reading. But is it what I should be reading?
Blow that, says Mr Random. He’s a proper, instinctive liberal rather than a liberal through current political expediency, like me. He says, read what you enjoy and be damned as to whether it’s what you should be reading. I’m not sure I can be quite so casual and permissive. Obviously there are other things on my list – some classic and contemporary fiction, a lot of non-fiction and let’s not forget the Don. But they take a serious investment of time which is not always entirely compatible with the book-a-week premise of the challenge. (I have noticed that many of the people who knock off 100 volumes or more seem to concentrate on quick-read young adult fiction – I’m just pointing this out, not being judgemental.)
I have been trying to vary what’s on my reading list. But another outcome that I was looking for was to get through the incredible backlog of bought-and-not-read volumes cluttering up my flat. And, guess what I’ve been buying? Largely, but not exclusively, the crime novel or thriller that can be turned around in approximately 48 hours, contains a good bit of action and a nice, intellectually-satisfying puzzle to solve. Which means that notching up a hit parade of impressive authors, while gratifying to the ego, is only one of many possible criteria for making all this work.
Evidently I’m not the only person whose mind has been running on this matter. The BBC News website has a piece (let’s not be uncharitable and call it an extended plug) on a book by a former Booker Prize judge that’s just being published. It’s about how to choose what you read. You can plough through the whole thing here – but the following bit was what got me thinking:
Booker judge gives novel advice
“When I started my reading career books were hard to come by. Now it’s the opposite. Sometimes you feel you’re being crushed by the weight of books available.
“There is so much choice, all of it tempting and much of it good,” he adds.
“What I wanted to do, as much for myself as anyone else, was find strategies to get through this extraordinary thicket.”
To maximise the enjoyment of reading fiction, Mr Sutherland argues, the reader must develop individual criteria based on personal preferences.
These can be hard to establish when every bookshop’s shelves come groaning with instructions, exhortations and endorsements.
“I get slightly worried when everyone buys The Da Vinci Code,” he says. “It’s like a herd of thundering cattle, all heading in the same direction.
“If there is a message in the book, it’s choose for yourself – find out who you are and what fiction works for you.
Leaving aside the pointless dig at Dan Brown, something that always gets on my nerves, I find that doing the challenge is indeed helping me to work out what it is I like to read. And I’m coming to the conclusion that reading for enjoyment, as opposed to reading for educational purposes, or to improve your mind, or to give yourself something to brag about at dinner parties, may well be an under-appreciated pastime. As long as it’s not all you do…
