Given your reading rate and life expectancy, how many more books would you say you're going to get read?

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And, more importantly, have you started rejecting entire chunks of literature because you now know you're not going to have time for them?

Is this too depressing an idea for a thread? Maybe.

For example, I have no plans to ever add Cormac McCarthy to my reading list, no matter how good people might tell me he is. Also I don't think I'm going to read Ulysses again, but that could change.

― accentmonkey, Monday, 26 February 2007 09:00 (eighteen years ago)

the way it's going just now i'll be surprised if i finish another book in my lifetime.

― jed_, Monday, 26 February 2007 12:28 (eighteen years ago)

I'm hoping my read-rate will increase a bit if I ever retire from working, but if it doesn't, I probably have 30 years of reading left and I average 100 books/year, so 3000. I have stopped rereading so much, though I might give Ulysses and Moby Dick another go.

― Jaq, Monday, 26 February 2007 14:11 (eighteen years ago)

Probably about 3 - 4000 to go, which is depressing.

I think I've written off pretty much everything written before about 1920. Apart from a few Russians. And doing any re-reading seems like a waste...

― Ray, Monday, 26 February 2007 14:44 (eighteen years ago)

", I have no plans to ever add Cormac McCarthy to my reading list, no matter how good people might tell me he is"

he is ok , but he is not a classic "must" read.you can relax about that.

the point i think, is to try and figure what books will you like at the end,before starting to read them:
if you read a lot, you probably know what will give you pleasure and satisfaction the most , and you won't have to read medicore fiction, and waste yr time.
true,sometimes you will fail, but usually it works.at least for me.
so,in the end, if ill read lets say 1000 books more,at least i most of them were great (and theres a lot of shitty books you know, a really good book is sometimes a rare diamond)

― Zeno, Monday, 26 February 2007 14:50 (eighteen years ago)

I reckon I've got another 3,000 to go. I wonder if it would be weird to make a wall chart? I could leave room for new releases...

― accentmonkey, Monday, 26 February 2007 15:52 (eighteen years ago)

I'd estimate I might read about 1500 more books before I drop. This doesn't trouble me, no matter how many good books there are that I will never read. I don't plan on eating every flavor of ice cream at Baskin-Robbins either, and there are far fewer of them than good books.

Allowing this to trouble one's mind is self-defeating and a cause of needless suffering (as Buddha so cogently pointed out in his Four Noble Truths). Desires are endless and life is not. This is a design flaw. By recognizing when this flaw is operating upon you, it is possible to neutralize its effects to some extent. I prefer to live, read what good books I may and enjoy what I am given to enjoy.

― Aimless, Monday, 26 February 2007 18:08 (eighteen years ago)

Or, I could start a spreadsheet.

― accentmonkey, Monday, 26 February 2007 19:23 (eighteen years ago)

I've basically rejected the chunk of literature known as "literature." Case in point: did not read House of Mirth for book group last night.

― Laurel, Monday, 26 February 2007 19:31 (eighteen years ago)

more fool you. House Of Mirth is stunning.

― jed_, Monday, 26 February 2007 20:57 (eighteen years ago)

If I had five more books to read before I die -- well, besides the old joke about picking really really long books -- but I still think I'd just read the same five books I would read next anyways -- well, excepting perhaps books read for classes. If you see what I mean. Will I spend as much of my life happily reading as I'd like? Probably.

― Casuistry, Monday, 26 February 2007 21:13 (eighteen years ago)

Will I spend as much of my life happily reading as I'd like? Probably.

This is the more important thing, to me. I worry more about losing the ability to read (vision/comprehension) or to enjoy being read to than I worry about getting through my to-be-read pile before I shove off this mortal coil.

― Jaq, Monday, 26 February 2007 23:17 (eighteen years ago)

I'm amused that several people have used the word "worry" in relation to something I essentially intended as a game. Oh well.

― accentmonkey, Monday, 26 February 2007 23:25 (eighteen years ago)

13,000 if I make it to 80, so that's not too bad. The question is where I'll keep all the fuckers.

― James Morrison, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:07 (eighteen years ago)

Well to be fair:

Is this too depressing an idea for a thread? Maybe.

― Casuistry, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 00:35 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.listology.com/content_show.cfm/content_id.22845/Books

― Zeno, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:02 (eighteen years ago)

In the interest of accuracy, I would advise all those who expect that they will raise one or more children at some future time to make allowance for this by slashing your estimate to about a quarter of your current reading rate for the first several years and only creeping it up gradually for the next decade. Moreover - I do like that word - as I said: moreover, we should each allow for a certain gathering decrepitude as we pass age 70.

― Aimless, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:19 (eighteen years ago)

aimless otm

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:23 (eighteen years ago)

I swear, I couldn't stop myself:

Results 1 - 10 of about 40 from ilx.wh3rd.net for "aimless otm". (0.27 seconds)

― Aimless, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 01:36 (eighteen years ago)

However, for the sake of perspective:

Results 1 - 10 of about 11,233,432 from ilx.wh3rd.net for "nabisco otm". (0.31 seconds)

― Aimless, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 02:40 (eighteen years ago)

I'm rejecting anything I can't find in hardback. I'm also rejecting children.

― Eoghan, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 16:18 (eighteen years ago)

― Noodle Vague, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 17:28 (eighteen years ago)

"Casuistry OTM" has like 17, but some of the 37 "Chris OTM"s seem to be me as well.

This sounds like a good ILE thread.

― Casuistry, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 18:27 (eighteen years ago)

Holy crap, looking back at the collection of times people have called you "OTM" is gratuitously satisfying. Even if a notable number of them come from one poster (cough*kenl*cough).

― Casuistry, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 18:40 (eighteen years ago)

Heh! No kidding!

Casuistry OTM! ;)

― Jaq, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 18:47 (eighteen years ago)

(sorry sorry - couldn't help myself...)

― Jaq, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 19:26 (eighteen years ago)

that's all right, chris, i take it all back

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 20:16 (eighteen years ago)

actually i checked and i only saw about three from me to you

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 20:17 (eighteen years ago)

which is about as many as i received from anybody

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 20:17 (eighteen years ago)

not that i'm fishing

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 20:18 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.ziemlichkraus.de/brautigan/Trout30r3.jpg

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 04:36 (eighteen years ago)

I found two "Ken OTM"s where the Ken was you and the OTMer was me. But you change names a lot, plus there's ken c competition...

― Casuistry, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 16:01 (eighteen years ago)

All of Proust as well as Samuel Richardson's Clarissa, or, The History of a Young Lady ("an exceptionally long novel," says Wikipedia) are pretty much out of the picture for me at this stage. I read the first page or two of Proust—the bit where he is remembering a type of cookie—five or six times when I worked at a bookstore, intending each time to begin reading him in earnest. Upon reflection I realized that most literary and cultural references to Proust go no further than this initial image (as if nobody else bothered to read any further either) and have since made no further attempts. Poor old Proust.

Ulysses is actually quite manageable and quite re-readable, but you have to approach it in the same way that Deleuze and Guattari suggest you read the Mille Plateaux (which is a book I'll never finish, incidentally): that is to say you should read it like you would listen to a record. I have had pretty good success by re-reading some of the sections again and again, while others I can't be bothered with and skip forward or backward through the book looking for something interesting.

― fields of salmon, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 20:18 (eighteen years ago)

Oh, I'm also wondering whether I will ever finish anything by Iain Sinclair. I think the bit in—I think it is—London Orbital where the photographer hints that his prose is unreadable ("You should try writing clearer sentences," or something like that) is a telling auto-critique.

― fields of salmon, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 20:23 (eighteen years ago)

I read the first page or two of Proust—the bit where he is remembering a type of cookie
B-b-b-but the madeleine doesn't actually appear until maybe a hundred pages into it. I suppose "first page or two" can be seen as the first one or two hundred pages when we compare that enormous work with average-length novels.

I'm not going to try to calculate how much I "have left to read", since it doesn't really matter much to me. Plus, I've always been uneven as far as quantity and tempo goes, so it's not easy enough for me to take the time to do it.
I like re-reading. I like following references from book to book, and looking up things I don't understand. I have to limit that though, as my ignorance knows no topic it doesn't want to envelope, while another part of me wishes to fight it back in all places at once, which results in some recursive nightmare of looking up things I don't understand. That tends to lead to absolutely nothing, just a lot of sightseeing.
I like turning back a few pages and re-reading sections I liked. I like picking up books (both read and unread ones) and reading random pages or passages. I like to argue with the author. I like taking breaks to think about what I've read.

To backtrack a bit and expand: I like to re-read books and find them to be new books. Partly because I not only often forget many (most) of the details, but also major elements, both in plot, prose, structure, character and content. Then there's the history I bring to it, which further changes my experience of books, allowing me to find nuances that I've ignored before, and not necessarily just allusive ones, but obvious (to others, I suppose) use of elements like tone and subtext.

I do rather wish I'd studied literature at some point. I often feel slightly envious when I read well-informed and well-thought out essays on literature. Still, I have a lovely time with all these books, and it only gets better as I have more of a personal (literary) history to look back on and compare what I'm reading with, be it something entirely new to me, or something I've already visited.

Oh, that went off-topic rather too quickly. Sorry.

― Øystein, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 21:09 (eighteen years ago)

"I'm also wondering whether I will ever finish anything by Iain Sinclair" -- I've tried and failed with him a number of times. In the end, just read the funny bookselling chapters of 'White Chappell..." and forget the rest.

― James Morrison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 02:43 (eighteen years ago)

I can't even bring myself to read this thread because this is the question that haunts my every waking moment. so thanks for articulating my fear of death!

― horseshoe, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:14 (eighteen years ago)

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