Last night's class was great. I felt, for the first time in a long time, that my intellectual needs were being satisfied. Even if we were just talking about the different subgenres in Mystery, and the difference between Chicklit and romance and erotica. For me, these topics are enormously interesting. I could talk about them for hours. I wasn't bored even for a minute in class (except when a couple booktalkers didn't follow directions), and really felt as if there were some very interesting things being said.
But I don't think everyone in the class felt that way. I think a few of the women around me were bored. Bored with the discussion. I could almost hear their thought processes: "A book is a book is a book. Why do we have to analyze it?" And when we started talking about series, and how forgiving we are as Readers--a few of them seemed to get almost enragedly bored. If that makes sense. "Who cares if a writer goes in a new direction? Stop reading her/his books! It's easy." And I can see where these women are coming from, I really can. When a topic is boring to you, it becomes boring to sit through hours of discussion about it. But perhaps maybe this isn't the class for them. Because at the heart of it, this class is about Readers, and these women are readers with a lower-case r. There is a difference.
My mom and sister--two of the dearest people in my life--are voracious readers. Not Readers. It's not an insult at all--it's just the way they read. My mom loves her mysteries, and my sister loves romance (and a limited amount of literary fiction, maybe more than I like) and they read a lot. But if you asked them to talk about the differences between suspense and thriller for two hours, I'm not sure they'd want to. Pragmatic as they are, I think they'd feel that what does it matter, as long as you like the book. Like I said, this doesn't diminish the fact that they both love to read, and read every night if possible. But it is different from me. I am passionate about books. I eat, sleep and breathe books. I could talk about books for hours--abstractly or concretely. I want to know why I read what I read, and why other people read. I truly want to understand the difference between chicklit and romance. I like books--owning, holding, understanding. I am attached to both the physical and mental aspects of books. I am just attached to books. It's a form of insanity, I think.
Anyway, my point is that these women, who were bored last night, are in for a lot of torture. Because there are those of us in the class--the Readers--who will hijack the discussion every week. And that's exactly how the class should be. This is a class for Readers, by Readers. I hope by the end of the class, the readers in the class come to understand the urgency of reading I feel. And I hope that I can somehow understand how detached they seem to be about it. But I'm not holding my breath.
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