Books!
Motivated by the examples of astarael23 and bloodbeauty - who are involved in, or at least interested in, "read X number of books in one year" type challenges - I have this year been pondering the question of how much I read. I've kept a list of everything I've read so far this year, mainly to indulge my curiosity.
Such book challenges strike me as problematic. I can be quite lazy at times, and I must say that if I were told simply to read as many books in one year as I possibly could, I would be unable to avoid the temptation to read disproportionate numbers both of very slim books, and of books which are unreasonably easy to read. In essence, I would read complete crap, and what would be the point in that?
But, and this is the punch-line, even the driest investigation of the extent of my reading has not been immune to gerrymandering. This came to a head recently when poking around in Waterstones for a new Italo Calvino book: faced with the choice of a volume comprising The Cloven Viscount, The Baron In The Trees and The Nonexistent Knight versus a volume containing only the first two of these titles, I actually dithered. If I bought the latter volume, I would be able to add one more to the score in return for less time and effort... but the two books were the same price, so this would be patently stupid...! In the end I made the sane choice and bought the larger one. I haven't finished it yet.
Anyway, for the benefit of those who might be interested, here's the year so far, discounting rereads.
H G Wells - The Invisible Man
Jon Ronson - The Men Who Stare At Goats
Glen Duncan - I, Lucifer
Kurt Vonnegut - Breakfast of Champions
Yoshida Mitsuru - Requiem for Battleship Yamato
Italo Calvino - If On A Winter's Night A Traveller
Terry Pratchett - Jingo
Italo Calvino - The Castle of Crossed Destinies
Marjane Satrapi - Persepolis
Jorge Luis Borges - The Aleph
Kurt Vonnegut - God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater
Italo Calvino - Invisible Cities
Mikhail Bulgakov - A Dead Man's Memoir
Salman Rushdie - Shame
Khushwant Singh - Burial At Sea
Khushwant Singh (ed.) - Best Indian Short Stories, vol. I
Philip K. Dick - Ubik
Jeff Noon - Automated Alice
Isaac Asimov - Foundation
Isaac Asimov - Foundation and Empire
Isaac Asimov - Second Foundation
Jorge Luis Borges - The Book Of Sand
Such book challenges strike me as problematic. I can be quite lazy at times, and I must say that if I were told simply to read as many books in one year as I possibly could, I would be unable to avoid the temptation to read disproportionate numbers both of very slim books, and of books which are unreasonably easy to read. In essence, I would read complete crap, and what would be the point in that?
But, and this is the punch-line, even the driest investigation of the extent of my reading has not been immune to gerrymandering. This came to a head recently when poking around in Waterstones for a new Italo Calvino book: faced with the choice of a volume comprising The Cloven Viscount, The Baron In The Trees and The Nonexistent Knight versus a volume containing only the first two of these titles, I actually dithered. If I bought the latter volume, I would be able to add one more to the score in return for less time and effort... but the two books were the same price, so this would be patently stupid...! In the end I made the sane choice and bought the larger one. I haven't finished it yet.
Anyway, for the benefit of those who might be interested, here's the year so far, discounting rereads.
H G Wells - The Invisible Man
Jon Ronson - The Men Who Stare At Goats
Glen Duncan - I, Lucifer
Kurt Vonnegut - Breakfast of Champions
Yoshida Mitsuru - Requiem for Battleship Yamato
Italo Calvino - If On A Winter's Night A Traveller
Terry Pratchett - Jingo
Italo Calvino - The Castle of Crossed Destinies
Marjane Satrapi - Persepolis
Jorge Luis Borges - The Aleph
Kurt Vonnegut - God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater
Italo Calvino - Invisible Cities
Mikhail Bulgakov - A Dead Man's Memoir
Salman Rushdie - Shame
Khushwant Singh - Burial At Sea
Khushwant Singh (ed.) - Best Indian Short Stories, vol. I
Philip K. Dick - Ubik
Jeff Noon - Automated Alice
Isaac Asimov - Foundation
Isaac Asimov - Foundation and Empire
Isaac Asimov - Second Foundation
Jorge Luis Borges - The Book Of Sand