This week as I searched my house for reading material, I decided upon a book which I’ve already read three times. It made me wonder how many of you repeat read.
For me, if a book has a reputation of being really good, I don’t borrow it from my library, I wait to own it. On the other hand, I have friends who read once and move on—no matter how good it is.
I know some writers read some works more than once. In Stein on Writing, Sol Stein says, “To teach short story writing, he had us read James Joyce’s “The Dead” over and over. It was from this practice that I learned the value of dissecting a piece of writing repeatedly until it surrendered its secrets.
Knowing that all books aren't created equal, for this week's polls, I’m narrowing it down to your absolutely top five favorite books.
I rarely re-read a book. Certain titles will forever be special to me, but I find that I'd rather give my time to searching for that next great reading treasure. I also find a certain fear that if go back and re-read a favorite, it'll reveal itself as something less--like a first love that seemed so vibrant in third grade, but might not stand the test of time.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I still go back to Lewis and Tolkien on a regular basis. I've re-read Hawthorne's short stories numerous times. And of books, the Bible continues to astound. (Ecclesiastes is my new favorite book.)
I've probably read Little Women at least 10 times, most of them before I was 21. Gone with the Wind, at least 5. I've done some re-reading as an adult but very little. There are just too many books released that I want to read. I don't have time to go back. For a few, I wish I did.
ReplyDeleteOn average I reread books 2-6 times, but I've read absolute favorites more often than that. As a teen, I read The Outsiders at least ten times. I've read Gone with the Wind at least a dozen times (I read it annually for over a decade.) I intend to do the same with other favorites.
ReplyDeleteI had never re-read a favorite book until Kristen Heitzmann's Secrets and Unforgotten. There was something about the protagonist's heart that got to mine--his passion for God and life just drilled me, I identified. Those are the only two novels I've reread in spite of other favorites.
ReplyDeleteOne step up on rereading just might be rewriting. Take your favorite and move it somewhere - in time, or place, or through changes in character traits. Write it again and you will no doubt discover more about the original than a hundred reads. Check out Anne Pigone's rewrite of "The Dead" to see how one author rediscovered Joyce. You can find it here: The Ugly
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