SLOW READER AND NOTES ON SHANTARAM
I have read 1 (one) book in the last 3 weeks. I find this deeply distressing as a usually fervent reader, and regular preacher of 'there's always time to read'. Turns out, when your degree is reading-based, and those readings are heavy, the last thing you want to look at is a book.
In the interest of keeping this blog personal, I'll say what every student thinks: university has me swamped. I've frequently described this first month back as feeling like having my head held under water. My average reading pace was 2 books a week, and now it takes me 3 weeks to read one? Dissatisfied.
So while I'm coming to terms with officially being a slow fiction reader, I believe I am now an established fast academic reader. Reading the quantity I have this year has so vastly improved my skills, and I am whipping through texts. What your English teacher told you at school is true! (And what I tell my students now). Reading is a practice. A learned skill.
So really, I haven't stopped reading, I've just changed my material. And I'm not going to write about it because it is largely boring. However I technically have 65 books from the year to report on, and will get to that soon.
Let's talk a little about Shantaram, a novel I wish I could dive into right now. It provides total escapism into 1980s Bombay, and Gregory David Roberts' dangerous, prison-break life deep in the bowels of it. The author asserts this is a novel, not an autobiography, but I found it so hard to break from the idea that it must be true. I wanted it to be true: the smells, sights, emotions and tastes were too raw, beautiful and real to be fiction. The tales are wild, at times unbelievable, and yet I wanted to believe it. As I carried the 921 pages on my adventure through Budapest and Vienna, I was sucked into his. At times the stories were so incredibly heavy (physically too), but I craved the knowledge of change, love, spirit and honour that is kept between the leaves.
In the interest of keeping this blog personal, I'll say what every student thinks: university has me swamped. I've frequently described this first month back as feeling like having my head held under water. My average reading pace was 2 books a week, and now it takes me 3 weeks to read one? Dissatisfied.
So while I'm coming to terms with officially being a slow fiction reader, I believe I am now an established fast academic reader. Reading the quantity I have this year has so vastly improved my skills, and I am whipping through texts. What your English teacher told you at school is true! (And what I tell my students now). Reading is a practice. A learned skill.
So really, I haven't stopped reading, I've just changed my material. And I'm not going to write about it because it is largely boring. However I technically have 65 books from the year to report on, and will get to that soon.
Let's talk a little about Shantaram, a novel I wish I could dive into right now. It provides total escapism into 1980s Bombay, and Gregory David Roberts' dangerous, prison-break life deep in the bowels of it. The author asserts this is a novel, not an autobiography, but I found it so hard to break from the idea that it must be true. I wanted it to be true: the smells, sights, emotions and tastes were too raw, beautiful and real to be fiction. The tales are wild, at times unbelievable, and yet I wanted to believe it. As I carried the 921 pages on my adventure through Budapest and Vienna, I was sucked into his. At times the stories were so incredibly heavy (physically too), but I craved the knowledge of change, love, spirit and honour that is kept between the leaves.
 |
| A page I loved and felt deeply; my beloved Biarrtiz. |
Comments
Post a Comment