I read to engage.I read to learn.
I read so I can say, "No way, that is not possible."
I read so I can exclaim, "That's It! That's exactly it!"
I read to escape.
I read to understand.
I read so I have an excuse to cry tears I can't cry in real life.
I read so I can laugh out loud
I read so I can nudge my husband, saying, "Hey, listen to this."
I read to sort, to order, to classify.
I read to revel in the beauty of language.
I read to receive the authors' out-reached hands they extend through their books.
I read to assure myself I'm not the only one.
Why do you read?
[Mendis pondering his fate by indi.ca; Reading by paulbence; reaching out by alfarman. All pictures found at Flickr Commons.]
8 comments:
What a lovely post!
I read to laugh and cry. (If a book hits me emotionally--and it's very hard to do--but if that happens, then it's gold.)
I read to escape. To delve into another world, even for a few hours, and lose myself.
Yat-Yee,
Can't touch that! You did a fantastic job of saying why you read and I would say 'all of the above.' You touched me with this post. Thanks.
I am jealous. In high school, I would finish off about a book a day, I was famous for sitting in class reading a book and raising my hand with my nose still in the book to argue with the history teacher when he said something I did not agree with (often concerning the book I was reading).
Then somewhere in college the material both changed in character (more math, less humanities) and the difficulty level caught up with my ability to multi-task and I had to read things several times to get them, or actually re-derive the math myself. I traded the ability to multi-task for the ability to solve differential equations on cocktail napkins (one of the sure signs you are a geek, even if your major was not EE).
Now, about 90% of my reading is to learn, and I have very little time to read for the joy of language, and most of what time I have for that is taken up by the hour or so a day I spend reading to the kids.
Thanks for chiming in.
Megan: losing myself, most certainly.
John: Hope you get more time to do the kind of reading that you used to enjoy so much. Reading to kids: a most under-rated perk of parenthood.
Tricia and Beth: thanks for your kind wor
All I can add to your beautiful post is that I read to create the perfect ending to my day.
What you said!!!! Wonderful, perfectly-written post!
Wow! I think you've got it all covered!
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