There was a time when I’d quite happily pack up old books and take them to the charity shop. I’d spend a short time deciding which ones were not important to me or which ones I’d never read again; which ones I couldn’t quite remember reading and which ones I disliked or never quite got round to. But not any more. I’ve come to realise that the books on my bookshelves are, more often than not, a little part of my life story. And, while I may never even open some of them again, I couldn’t bear to see them go.
The books on my shelves are my story: the greatest books I have ever read, side to side with some of the not so good ones. No matter. They all add up to a life of reading. The books we read made us who we are, almost literally, and every one is as important as the other. Every Enid Blyton book you read helps form you as a reader, even though they might be unreadable now. And, by God, they are unreadable now. Every time you go to your bookshelves they are there: a comforting reminder of your past self.
I keep one shelf free for my ‘to read next’ list. Books I pick up in second-hand shops, books recommended to me through Backlisted podcast, or anything I read about on Twitter. Of course it’s a never-ending list but that’s okay too. I’ll get to them eventually, mostly. Those books say more about my changing taste than any others. If the younger me who read Gabriel Garcia Marquez quite comfortably could chat with the older me reading the Patrick Melrose novels, I wonder how that conversation would go. It seems strange that, while arguing that our reading brains develop over time, I still convince myself that ‘Crime and Punishment’ might be a bit of a slog twenty years after reading it for the first time.
And, to the ghosts of books future: I’m waiting for you. I’ll keep you a space. I’ve no idea in what direction I’ll wander but there are more years behind me than in front of me. Time is limited and my current reading could take me off in a number of directions. I know what I’d like to read but I knew what I wanted to read six weeks again and that didn’t quite work out. You have to make space for things that come along and tempt you. Otherwise the reasons for reading them in the first place get lost.
I’ve spent much of the last few years of my teaching career encouraging young people to read and be readers. So often it’s not about the books though: it’s about the experience of reading those books and what we, as individuals, bring to them or take from them. Otherwise they are merely lumps of paper. But to talk about reading and what it means to be a reader is really important some times. A bit of navel gazing is fine. And that’s all this blog is about.