Years ago, before circumstances changed in my life, I took solitary, restful vacations. My maternal grandparents had built a cabin in the Wayne Highlands of Pennsylvania, on the shores of a mountaintop volcanic lake. Small and private it was - quite simply - paradise.
I went on my vacations with a car packed with a minimum of clothes (of the most comfy variety) my boombox and CDs, an inaugural case of beer (Bud Lite, for those who care about such things [!]), and books. Dozens of books. LL Bean Bags filled to bursting with books. Of every size, shape, weight and genre. Romance and mysteries, certainly. The cottage, tucked in amid the quiet woods, was quite conducive to reading fantasy and every year, among other titles, I'd drag my dog-eared copy of The Sword of Shannara along. A complete Shakespeare was ubiquitous (especially for the sonnets - those nuggest of goodness perfect for a brilliantly sunny afternoon or for a tempestuous stormy day). Ever read MacBeth by the light of a lone bulb in a tiny cabin while the wind howled outside in the pitch darkness that can be found only in the country?
Also along for the literary ride were hefty biographies, military histories, complex sociological tomes and slender treatises. In short - everything and anything. Whatever struck my fancy or could be anticipated to cater to my mercurial moods. Of course, I was lambasted annually upon packing, perenially scoffed at by my Mother.
"You cannot possibly think you're going to read all of those books!"
"Of course not, but you never know what mood I'll be in. I have to have a SELECTION!"
"The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich? Really?"
"In case I'm feeling serious!"
And so it would go.
When these vacations became impossible, I still read, ceaselessly, but it wasn't the same. There wasn't that sense of escape to a world where nothing but the written word mattered. Where if I chose not to turn on my music, there was no sound, no voice, no nothing except the sounds of nature. No road traffic, or construction noise, neighbors yelling. Where nothing but books filled my days, from the moment I arose in the morning until the minute I could no longer keep my eyes open and would turn off the lights to sleep. My opportunity for wallowing in books was gone.
Now I pack one (OK, so two) for my commute to work. I can try to read at lunch but damn and blast there are all these PEOPLE everywhere! People not reading books at all. People who are talking, texting, twittering for Goddess' sake and not caring a whit about reading a great book. Or any book. Not even the back of a matchbook.
So I grew away from those times when I would, with relish, sink into a great tome. Be seduced into the pages to such an extent that, suddenly, when dragged from my reading reverie, I would look up and ... for just a moment ... not know who or where I was.
True, time for reading is at a premium. Weekends are rife with chores - with the hustle and bustle and comings and goings and to's and fro's. But hope springs eternal, and I dash through them reciting a litany that keeps me going: "Finish the shopping and you can read"; "Finish the gardening and you can read"; "Finish the laundry, cleaning, cooking, vet visits, garage visits, banking, bill paying......and you can READ!!!!!!" But the time is there. I simply have to fight harder to carve it out of my day. Distance myself further from the distractions. The reward, after all, will be what I love best .... the chance to wallow again in a book.
Then, when I've satisfied my (admittedly easily appeased) guilt, I will settle myself down with a book. On my bed in the corner of my attic room; in the comfy chair beneath the window; or outside on a bench under the spreading Sycamore tree in my garden where I'm secluded among the green of my garden yard, though I can still hear and see the rest of the world. And I will, again, just sit, and read.
See, here's the rub. I cannot get enough of books. Any books. All books. Fat, thin, small, large, heavy or lightweight. There's no subject I don't find fascinating and, most importantly, no book from which I have not learned something. A word, a fact or an idea. No book that has not made me think, made me mad, or astounded me, thrilled me or comforted me. For every book I read I'm inspired to read another. A mystery by Agatha Christie? Let's read one by Dorothy Sayres and compare and contrast. A bio of Mary, Queen of Scots? I need to know more about her worthy adversary, Queen Elizabeth the First. And on, and on, and so it goes (Vonnegut - Slaughterhouse Five).
Because for every book you read there is an ancestor to that book. Lord of the Rings descends from The Brothers Grimm and ancient mythological texts. James Bond from Robin Hood. Sam Shepard from Shakespeare. No book is written in a vacume. It is written upon the knowledge and the words of those who have gone before. Books evolve from the genes of the books before them, if you will.
All of this is just to say that I've reached a point in my life where I'm actually worried that I won't have enough time for all the books I want to read. (No matter my familial heritage that puts me, at aged 54, literally squarely in midlife!) For the books I am challenged to read. For the books I feel I SHOULD read because the information contained within will enrich me as a person. Broaden my horizons, and beautify my soul. So, I'm going to stop the cerebral wringing of my hands, and bemoaning the lack of hours in the day and, sintead, plunge right in. I'm going to redouble my efforts to regain that joy that reading has given me since childhood. To fight harder for the time to study and read varied and wonderful stories. To reach the nirvana that - throughout my life - only reading has provided me.
September has always held that wonderful "going back to school" atmosphere for me. New, clean white notebooks. A slew of new pens. And books - tons and tons and tons of books. To read, to study, to learn from, to be amazed at. One of the things I'm saddest about is that I never carved out a career for myself in academia. To be admist learning, great books, and ideas for all of my life? What more marvelous career could there be? Well, maybe I can't have the career, but I sure as hell can read the books!
So this year I'm going back to school. There's no reason I can't do it myself. A sort of self-made graduate program. A personal MFA. Hell, I've got more than 22,000 books stuffed into my little home - and look at any "greatest books ever written" list, and you'll find them all (somewhere) in my collection!
So, how to do it? That's the question. And the answer: Read. It's that simple. Read the greatest books and writings known to man. Seek out the odd and the curious and the oldest of the old and the best of the best. I don't care if that means reading old, dead, white European males, or 20th Century women of color, or 19th Century Middle-Eastern folk. It's the wealth of writing - the breadth of the material, the quality of the words - that matters. So, I've gathered those "greatest" lists and I've culled, combined, blended and melded. A daunting list, certainly, but, then again, have I mentioned? I do so love a challenge.
From Harold Bloom's, "The Western Canon", David Denby's "Great Books"; The Modern Library "best" lists, fiction and non, New York Public Library's list of the Books of the Century, and the recent Newsweek list of the "Top 100 Books of All Time". Maybe even a few culled from here, and there. Compilations of the must-read titles that no enlightened adult can live without.
It's going to be hundreds of books. That's right, HUNDREDS, and damned if I'm not excited, thrilled and quivering to get started. But, then, I AM waiting for the first day of school, after all. And I'm ready. Got my supplies and everything. My notebook (laptop), my pens and pencils (laptop), and my list of great books.
But wait. Besides simply reading these books for my own satisfaction, I have another goal.
I want to do for great books what Julie has done for Julia. What Oprah has done for popular fiction. Iwant not just to read them, experience them, abut to share the beauty of them - with you. In the hope that you, too, will be inspired to pick up that book you never finished in high school. I want to instill a passion, a curiousity, a lust for that imposing tome too hefty and daunting to be considered before. A cravy for authors you've never heard of, from far away places and times. I bet you'll find they are more accesible than you thought. And that they have lessons to teach, joys to share and amazing journeys for us all. That, as Michael Dirda said in "Book by Book: Notes on Reading and Life", (and I paraphrase) that books can make you laugh, and cry, get turned on, and get enraged, but that most of all, they will open wide a vista of knowledge that you never knew existed.
So. Here I stand, like a greyhound in the slips, straining upon the start. The game's afoot!
How about you? Will you join me in my quest for knowledge? You will? Most excellent! The first day of school is nearly upon us, ladies and gentlemen!
Ready?
Set?
READ!
