How I Read
I read about forty books a year, and of those forty, around thirty are new encounters. The other ten are more or less the same ten. Open by Andre Agassi will be one. So will The Making of Rumours by Ken Caillat. The book about Jeff Buckley his manager wrote will be on there as well. And then The Hunger Games trilogy, and a few other fun ones. I can’t imagine my life as a reader without rereading. I treat my favorite books the way I treat my favorite albums: as a consistent, “take what you will from it,” part of my life. I’d say if I finish forty books in a year, there were probably one hundred that I started. It is like this: sometimes I listen to my favorite record, start to finish, but more often than not, I stop in for a song or two. Sometimes I read the entirety of a favorite book, but much more frequently, I will stay for a couple chapters. One of my favorite things to do is sit beside my bookshelf, and jump between books, reading a little bit here and there. I treat my book collection the way I treat YouTube or Spotify, which I guess is to say — I am there to be entertained. I read to have fun. And I suppose that means, for me, moving on when I feel like it. I realize to some readers, this conjures the opposite of ASMR. But for me, it represents how I preserve the joy in reading.
I’ve come to believe this method is better for me as a writer. There is the old, maybe not-so-old adage, “it is better to know one book intimately than one hundred books superficially” (Did Donna Tartt coin that? That feels impossible). I more or less believe this. I know people who can read a book once and remember every detail. This impresses me, because I’ll finish a book for the first time and not remember the protagonist’s name. The main things that stay with me after a first encounter are typically the voice, and whether or not I enjoyed the experience. Things like an author’s structural moves — their use of metaphor and navigation of detail — only become useful to me after having reread. And reread and reread. When I can recall sentences the way I can recall the melody to a favorite song, an author’s words join a congregation of those with which I see the world. When I am writing, I’m able to pull from different voices in that congregation, until the chorus of language creates a melody that is my own.
I believe that failure is an essential part of creative individuality. It is why I can read the same books over and over again, and never worry about copying someone else. Believe it or not, I do not have a hard time not writing like Toni Morrison. It doesn’t matter how often I read The Bluest Eye. Not writing like Toni Morrison is the easiest thing in the world for me to do, because I cannot, and never will be able to, write like Toni Morrison. But what I can do is some of what Toni Morrison can do. And some of what James Baldwin can do. And some of what Suzanne Collins can do. And so on and so forth. And all of my shortcomings in trying to become other authors ultimately lead to me fully becoming myself. Constructed of the various fragments that are what I am able to emulate. I believe there is a particular danger in talent, because every now and then, you do meet an artist who is able to copy others in a way that’s exact. That’s where reading widely, and I suppose having some strong moral fiber, becomes essential. But quite frankly, I would hate to be an artist that could do anything, in the same way I would hate to be a writer who reads and loves indiscriminately. It’s good to not like things and have to figure out why, in the same way it’s good to not be able to do something, and have to find a way to work around it. In my practice, limitation is the essence of creativity. It is a gift. One that allows me to treat my favorite voices as intimately as I would like, without having to worry about losing my own.
I feel guilty sometimes about not finishing books. About reading the same ones over and over again, or flipping to one favorite section of a story I otherwise didn’t like. But the reality, at the end of the day, is that most art, I don’t like. Most sentences, I’m not moved by. So it’s important for me to hold allegiance to what little I love. My hope is that one day, people will read me for pleasure. If I suck the joy out of my own reading practice, I feel as though I’ll lose the ability to edit towards that joy in my writing. Towards the people that want to share it. There is a fulfillment that comes with reading something new, or finally picking up a classic that everyone tells us we should read — but that fulfillment will never match, for me, the pleasure that comes with rereading a book I love. Or even just a sentence.
