Reading Like A Pig
Sohaila Abdulai writes:
Writers read with discrimination, to feed their own writing. They take reading seriously. I never got the memo.
Bookstores and libraries are hallowed places, where we nurture the life of the mind. People read books to learn and grow and connect. It’s serious business.
And then there’s me. I’m the party animal of reading. Bring on the snacks and the fillers and the main dishes and the healthy stuff, pour cheese and whipped cream and potato chips and marzipan on the pile, and shovel it into me. Not classy, not discerning, just wallowing in the words and the stories and kicking my legs in the air just for the fun of it.
People – in life, on social media – sometimes tend to humblebrag about their reading. Someone might say they read two books this month, someone else might post a softly lit photo of themselves with a glass of wine in one hand and a newly translated version of the fattest Russian novel of all time in the other. Me, I can’t tell anyone (nobody’s really going to read this blog, are they?) how much I read because then the secret will be out: I don’t do anything useful or productive with most of my time, I just gobble up books like candy.
I rip through thrillers. I weep through tragedies. I gasp through memoirs. I swoon over romances. I go so fast that sometimes I finish and cannot recall the next week how the book ended. This is not intelligent, thoughtful reading that I can justify as part of my writing process; it is pure gluttony. Books in, books out. Life is so short and they keep publishing new ones and reissuing old ones. That last book mentioned someone I never heard of. This book on the used shelf smells so good. My list is growing. Time is passing. Impatient and intoxicated, I skip over whole paragraphs in my rush to get to the next bit.
I have no rhyme or reason. I can’t tell you that because I’m a writer, I take notes and decide what’s best for me to take in and study. Instead I confess that I’ve actually done the opposite sometimes. When I was writing my book on rape, I knew I should be reading about sexual abuse. And I did, a bit. But I had to force myself. Who wants to live and breathe rape? I read some fantastic books about everything else while I was writing it, and I think that made it a better book. If I hadn’t read Lynnda Haupt, my rape book wouldn’t have mentioned starlings, and what a pity that would be. I read more graphic novels than academic papers. I’m never going to go on a talk show and talk about my highbrow writing process. Or, god forbid, pretentiously tell you what you should read.
I’m a sucker for a great cover. Margo’s Got Money Troubles is a terrific book, but would I have read it without the pink cover? I’m a sucker for a great review. I’m a sucker for a lame justification: if I have to go to the dentist today, I need to buy a book for the waiting room. If I’m flying south of the equator, I must read a South Pacific author. If it’s my brother’s birthday, it’s my duty to get myself a book about siblings.
Sometimes I have to slow down. Like reading Ocean Vuong’s novels, where each sentence is so freighted with beauty that you have to stop to catch your breath and wipe your eyes.
And there are those books that I’ve read a thousand times. None of them are fat Russian novels. Some have authors whose first name begins with G as in Georgette and last name begins with H as in Heyer. They are not generally considered great literature. But who gets to decide? They have seen me through difficult times and I love them like friends.
Between continents, e-reader, bedside, bag, and living room, I have several books going at once, and therefore my life feels crowded and unfailingly interesting, since I’m inhabiting so many worlds. I’m in New York and the Arctic and a Korean factory and a Stockholm dance club and a Zimbabwean beer joint. I’m in love with a mermaid, I’m murdering my best friend, I’m discovering a new prime number, I’m fighting invaders, I’m ogling the Earth from the moon. No job? No worries, there’s always P.G. Wodehouse or Banu Mushtaq. Jacinda Ardern has a memoir! Garcia Marquez’ posthumous novel is on the shelves! Look at that shiny blue Madame Bovary cover! My only limitations are a total lack of interest in horror stories, and the inability to be immersed in more than one novel at a time. My brain just can’t handle more than one fictional world, but I can easily be in the middle of plenty of non-fiction or poetry. Right now, Annie Dillard, David Sedaris and a Swedish bat scientist called Johan Eklof are my companions. And of course a few magazines and The Cloudspotters Guide. I tried to get into Walt Whitman but my eyes glazed over.
Told you, not classy. But oh, it’s fun!
Sohaila Abdulali is the author of several books, including What WeTalk About When We Talk About Rape. She is currently writing a book is about women, land and belonging.
