question for people who read a lot (most of you,i'd imagine)

im fairly tired and my brain is turned to smush after studying for repeat exams all day,so that probably wasn't expressed very well,but hopefully you get the gist of what i'm saying...

i want to know how many people actually have read entire proust novel. my hand is not even close to up. i read two or three pages of time regained

This worries me a lot, in as much as anything artwise does... I've read I guess 2000 books maybe, many I don't care about, but the ones I do I only remember strongly the most striking bits/ideas etc... so there's a great deal I'd like to reread, which bothers me as having worked in a suburban library I have 100s of withdrawn books I haven't read (First day I was there they were dumping "The Castle", so it's mostly good stuff). So, does reading or rereading take precendence? When reading creates more justifying rereading? And then there's the problem of having just moved all my books back into my parents' place, (aaargh) and now the shelves are all mixed up and sometimes I'm not even sure I remember if I've read a book AT ALL. Jeezus Beezus!

I know I tend to forget a lot, so I can't worry about it anymore or it would stop me from reading anything.

i forget what i read. i also forget movies i've seen . i have an appalling memory. it bothers me because its harder to carry on a conversation about something if you can't remember what you are talking about. but i'm too busy reading the next book to really care too much about it.

in college I started a list of books I'd finished, with dates, so I could have a reminder of reading them. otherwise, I might forget, and even start one again sometime. I forget what happens in books, too, or what characters there are, that sort of thing. I have a better memory for what it was like to have read books, and what the style felt like, that sort of thing. I don't necessarily try hard to remember factual details; if I want to remember them enough, I'll reread the book, or maybe pay more attention.

lately I've been starting more books than finishing, though, so it seems like lots of books that I might later be interested in remembering whether I had read them might slip through my list-sieve.

the books I consider it important to not forget, though, I tend to reread anyway, either straight through or in bits.

Sometimes I hold vague impressions, sometimes I quote verbatim. Depends on the material, the context I read it in, how I feel...there's a lot going into the memories, no formula.

I read fiction for the pleasure, but I know tons of people with photographic memories who remember the exact names, plot, etc of books while I only remember a general sort of feeling. Maybe this is bc I read fairly quickly. By the way, I have read the entire Proust (it's true) I read it off and on over the course of about 5 years and I must tell the above poster, stick with it, if will pay off tenfold!

I don't worry about it all that much. I certainly would like to remembmer more though. I think that if you are trying to remember what you read, just casually reading it is not enough (for most people anyway). If you want to increase the chance of remembering, you need to take notes and treat as studying rather than simply reading.

I sometimes like the fact that I forget large portions of some fiction I have read in the past. For instance, I have read Jane Bowles' "Two Serious Ladies" (or something like that) three times, and each time I got to be surprised anew, because I forgot about some of the unexpected plot twists. In fact, my little amazon.com reader's review of it seems to have been picked up all over the place, to my amusement. Granted, it's a little crazy for someone like me who doesn't read many novels to spend his time re-reading them, but I am not worried about it. I am much more unhappy at the thought of the giant heap of non-fiction I will never get around to reading.

I've read far less than all of you but I'll answer anyway. When I read books for school, I remember every little thing because I'm tested on every little thing. I'd rather read less carefully, forget, and enjoy it...because when it's not fun, when it's a learning assignment, i wouldn't read on my own at all.

I have read the entire Proust

Interesting recent fact I discovered -- H P Lovecraft was a massive Proust fan. Not something I would have expected!

what josh's first paragraph said. also there's a proust thread on here somewhere - maybe ricky t started it?? - and i've read it and wd recommend it to all.

I have kept records of what I've read since 1996 (& now it's online I update as I go and have a section for what I plan to read, which really helps me track stuff down - as does reading about books on the internet. I like sites where people review books (anyone know any good ones?) but I think I'm too crap at doing that and I just don't think I can react that way to books and I'm a bad writer. (the only thing I feel that I can review in any useful/meaningful way is films, and then mainly mainstream movies, and now not so much as I don't go to the movies at least once a week plus watch videos all the time like I used to for years). Getting sidelined, back to the book thing: I suspect that people who don't keep records read less than they think they do??? At least this is my case. I would think for sure I'm getting through a book a week, it seems crappy not to, yet this year I've "only" (only in terms of the one-a-week standard I have fixed on) read about 30. Though I guess now that I've quit uni I shld be able to easily reach 52. (I exclude essays, books I didn't read in their entirety, mags, online stuff, and kids books unless they're long like novels or whatever). I have a fairly bad memory even though I am a slow reader, and I know now to watch out for this because I can't trust that what I thought was a good book when I was say 20 is any good, but that effect is probably (hopefully) minimising as I edge away from the relative ignorance of (my) youth - (I say my youth with Rimbaud in mind I mean look at the vast amounts he read and remembered)! have to go will continue this a bit later.

I don't look down on people not reading a book a week, it's just for me with how much time and importance it seems like I devote to books - a lot of it is from doing less other stuff.

something that i really like in terms of books is reading aloud ie more than one person - as an adult I've only really done this with redaing a chapter of "the time machine" to my best friend every night which I really enjoyed. I think there was/is a group that did something similar with Proust, or did they just have a Proust-based book club I'm not sure.
I really would recommend keeping notes though.
One book I really loved that I wonder if I would still is the Counterfeiters by Andre Gide - I wonder particularly because I found his journals tedious. I think maybe it made me realise something that wouldn't have the same effect now but I do remember some of the pleasures of it. I often write down or photocopy sentences paragraphs or pages that particularly struck me or might have some continuing relevance. I also try to keep up the practise of circling words I am unfamiliar or unsure of in pencil then looking them up and thinking about them.

I am interested in any other ways people think are good for more active, retentive or enjoyable or different approaches to reading.

I tend to think if what's said is important enough, or effective enough, I'll remember it. In other words, it's the author job to have me remember their story, not mine.

Reading aloud is the best but it's difficult to cajole people into it. Dr jonson said only idiots read entire books - but i don't think he meant fiction.

I think all the books I've read will eventually bleed into one. Cumulative wisdom. And then I'll try writing my own book and realise I just copied everything else I've ever read.

Jel... don't...

Ezra Pound said that culture (kulchur) is what you have when you know something but aren't sure where you read it or exactly how it went, or something to that effect.

Reading aloud is the best but it's difficult to cajole people into it

yeah - to listening or reading? I remember once this drunkard friend I had started reading one of the CS Lewis boy and his horse books aloud to me but after about a page thought I was thinking it/he was doing something dumb and embarrassing and so got angry and stopped. I gues it's hard to get over the embarrassment. I really like reading out though.

I read loads, and keep no records (I used to do loads of reviews, which acted as some sort of record and did fix ideas about books pretty well, but I don't any more). I am very good at remembering a well-above-average amount of what I want to remember (if I'm reading non-fiction, particularly), while almost completely forgetting the plots of novels, which generally makes them more pleasurable to read again. I read A La Recherche Du Temps Perdu about six or seven years back - I devoured it in a week and a half: it was a treat for myself for successfully completing my first year at university. I remember little of the story, but lots of the style and sensibility. I am sure that I will reread it one day, maybe more than once. I think you can absorb, for instance, a better understanding of people and their thoughts and feelings and interaction from great literature, but this is by cumulative learning and exposure to masterly evocation of these things by diverse great minds, not by remembering every word, or even recalling much in the way of story details.

yeah reading aloud is great, whether you are on the listening end or the reading end.