Reading and privacy are somehow connected for me. I notice that my favorite memories of childhood reading were when I could wake up before everyone else and read quietly while the house was silent.
As a preteen I mostly read fanfiction and manga. In high school I reclaimed my book reader-identity: I loved most of the books I read in scho…
Reading and privacy are somehow connected for me. I notice that my favorite memories of childhood reading were when I could wake up before everyone else and read quietly while the house was silent.
As a preteen I mostly read fanfiction and manga. In high school I reclaimed my book reader-identity: I loved most of the books I read in school and went on to double major in English and journalism. My favorite kind of learning was always just reading in a book and taking notes in the margins, so I took a lot of joy from that practice. (Never went to grad school, so maybe that's why it's still golden in my memory!)
I didn't have a big "rut," but I did notice my relationship to reading changed in college. Goodreads really fucked me up. I kept a shelf-per-year and noticed I was always trying to outdo myself. This was encouraging me to leave books I really wanted to read aside, in favor of shorter ones that could pump up the numbers. Agh!
The first thing I did was stop rating books. The more I thought about it the more insane the idea of rating a book seemed: as if the point of a book is to meet-or-exceed expectations; as if we could do the same for books as we do with hotels and restaurants. But that still didn't really cut it. So I had to quit Goodreads for good. Now I just keep a list on my phone of "books and essays read" for a given year--no counting, just titles. I include long essays because I like to read big books of theoretical essays, but they literally take years to finish! Quitting Goodreads has gotten rid of all that optimization-feeling.
It has the other benefit of making my reading life feel more private to me again, which was more important than I thought!
I quit Goodreads for the same reasons. I felt like, "You can't tell me what to do!" I like tracking my reading - I keep a spreadsheet - but I don't like that little banner telling me I'm six books behind or whatever.
This resonates. I associate reading with privacy too. Not only the act, but the whole thing. It is intensely private for me. I don't share much while I'm reading, I don't want to discuss it with people afterwards (except one on one, occasionally) and my interpretations, what I've gained or understood are mine. I can't see the point in sharing, really because someone else brings their own experience to it, and take away something different. For that reason too, I don't join book clubs, nor read Good Reads 'reviews'. They are random opinions, which would never influence me towards buying or not buying a book. Sometimes I do rate books (only 5*) by small time or indie authors only, because they need it to sell books and I'm sympathetic to that.
Reading and privacy are somehow connected for me. I notice that my favorite memories of childhood reading were when I could wake up before everyone else and read quietly while the house was silent.
As a preteen I mostly read fanfiction and manga. In high school I reclaimed my book reader-identity: I loved most of the books I read in school and went on to double major in English and journalism. My favorite kind of learning was always just reading in a book and taking notes in the margins, so I took a lot of joy from that practice. (Never went to grad school, so maybe that's why it's still golden in my memory!)
I didn't have a big "rut," but I did notice my relationship to reading changed in college. Goodreads really fucked me up. I kept a shelf-per-year and noticed I was always trying to outdo myself. This was encouraging me to leave books I really wanted to read aside, in favor of shorter ones that could pump up the numbers. Agh!
The first thing I did was stop rating books. The more I thought about it the more insane the idea of rating a book seemed: as if the point of a book is to meet-or-exceed expectations; as if we could do the same for books as we do with hotels and restaurants. But that still didn't really cut it. So I had to quit Goodreads for good. Now I just keep a list on my phone of "books and essays read" for a given year--no counting, just titles. I include long essays because I like to read big books of theoretical essays, but they literally take years to finish! Quitting Goodreads has gotten rid of all that optimization-feeling.
It has the other benefit of making my reading life feel more private to me again, which was more important than I thought!
I quit Goodreads for the same reasons. I felt like, "You can't tell me what to do!" I like tracking my reading - I keep a spreadsheet - but I don't like that little banner telling me I'm six books behind or whatever.
This resonates. I associate reading with privacy too. Not only the act, but the whole thing. It is intensely private for me. I don't share much while I'm reading, I don't want to discuss it with people afterwards (except one on one, occasionally) and my interpretations, what I've gained or understood are mine. I can't see the point in sharing, really because someone else brings their own experience to it, and take away something different. For that reason too, I don't join book clubs, nor read Good Reads 'reviews'. They are random opinions, which would never influence me towards buying or not buying a book. Sometimes I do rate books (only 5*) by small time or indie authors only, because they need it to sell books and I'm sympathetic to that.