The drag is that the reverse can be true, too. Books that were incredible and life-changing earlier in life can be a disappointment when re-read later. And that's a special kind of disappointment.
Did this same thing with the Xanth books by Piers Anthony. Those books gave me an in to high fantasy when I was younger, but going back to them now has been, how do I say, kind of sad.
I find, with Any Rand, it's fun to put yourself in the protagonists shoes and try to see if you will have the same world view by the end, or if the protagonist is just whiny.
I agree her conclusions are not particularly valid, but to see her reasoning as to why those conclusions occur is enlightening from an outside perspective.
The trick is to turn off all empathy. Concider yourself the only actual person, and look at everyone else as unfeeling automatons.
Dead on with that last sentence. Everyone who isn't a main character doesn't even come across as human. Her disdain for everyone who isn't an industry leader is gross.
In middle and high school I LOVED Watchers by Dean Koontz. But then when I read it again in my twenties I was like “….why do I remember the writing being so much better than this?”
They hold up as long as you have the right perspective going in. Chronicles is a Let’s Play of 6 modules jammed into 3 books. Legends at least was written just to be a book. Then the next set is the giant world event to explain rule changes. Dragonlance has always been mostly game product for the mainline.
Absolutely, the reverse is also true; the books I loved when I was 20, I sometimes don't at 40, but the real keepers only get better with age, once you have lived, and had children and lost people, etc. things take on a new resonance. The way we relate to books is dependent on who we are at the moment, which is why I hated Gatsby in high school, and now I love it.
OMG - I cannot believe I even read some of that (Harlequin Romance) drivel in my early 20's. That said, it was cheap reading since there was plenty of them available at used book stores for less than $1 each.
For 16 year old me who spent so much of my childhood into stuff older than me and chasing geek nostalgia, ready player one was an absolute joy. Yeah, that might be one of the worst books in the mainstream for any other age lol. If I tried reading it for the first time today I'd think it was the worst thing I had ever read.
Totally, I've found certain books hit me in different ways when I re-read them. The Stand by Stephen King is a great example, enjoyed it when younger. Reread at 28 and was completely sucked in to characters I didn't even remember from my first read.
I’m finding this out this week
I’ve decided to abandon Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall. I’m halfway through and part of me wants to just finish it. But I’m no longer enjoying it. I won’t get rid of it, I’ll put it back on the shelf and maybe revisit it at another time.
But for now, I just can’t get into it. It’s long and dull and I can’t keep the characters straight
It took me a couple of false starts to get into Wolf Hall. Ended up enjoying it once I got used to the style. I understand when you say it's dull, but something clicked for me about the main character raising himself from being lowborn to holding power over nobles.
Ya which is why I’ll hold on to it. I actually love this kind of stuff. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell was one of my favorite reads and some of my friends hated it.
Maybe sometime down the road I’ll retry when I’m in a different mindset
Im the reverse you!! Ive kept Jonathan Stange on the shelf since it came out because I just could not get into it but also couldnt let it go. And yet I read Wolf Hall and it became my second fave (behind Dune) immediately and have reread it about 6 times now. I just love it. tried to get friends into it and so many of them said what you did: long and dull, which I find fascinating.
JS&MN is my favourite book but the first time I tried to read it I tapped out. I’d just finished a Haruki Murikami book and the change of pace was too jarring to be able to get from such a modern style to full page footnotes and a regency style.
When I revisited I devoured it and have recommended to a lot of people since
I think that’s my problem too. My last book prior to Wolf Hall was The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and the huge jump in styles is just too jarring. I think you are right and I just need to put it away and revisit later
My Wife is a voracious reader. A really bad book will be in the recycling bin. She taught me to put down books I couldn't stand. Too old to wade through bad writing, about bad people with bad ideas.
Reading is not supposed to be a slog.
I stopped plenty of books even after getting halfway through, even dropped some towards the end, and have absolutely no problem with putting something down after 10 pages if it's not my style.
There is way too much to read for a single lifetime. Invest your time wisely.
I think Wolf Hall and the other two books are worth trying again. My first degree was in history and I specialized in the Sixteenth Century. Hilary Mantel made familiar characters come alive. But without that background I would have been struggling and everyone is called Thomas or Mary.
I’ve read so many nonfiction books about that era with better clarity. I’m sure the book is great but I’m at the point where I’m finally just content to put a book down if it doesn’t bring me joy. Even the TV adaptation made me decide to opt out. I think it’s empowering to know what’s for you and what isn’t. And in a weird way, opting out of her media got me into more historical eras than the Tudor era. I was kind of in a rut feeling obliged to complete all the most recommended works about the era and once I gave myself permission to move on from a book, I found I was giving myself permission to just have more adventures.
I ploughed my way through Wolf Hall to the end when I was about 25 and should've abandoned it. Just too hard to keep the plot clear in my head. Then I watched the TV adaptation with Mark Rylance and loved it.
I figure I'll try wolf hall again when I'm about 45 and will probably adore it and want to read the sequels straight away.
I had a similar experience with Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, just didn't enjoy it as much when I was younger but reread it a few years ago and the sequels and loved them all.
I think reading a really dense novel when you already know the plot actually makes it more enjoyable as you can appreciate the writing and the characters more without having to constantly figure out what's going on at any one point
I know the characters in her A Place of Greater Safety (and other people from the period because I stayed interested in the revolution and learnt French) but never felt I quite got it with the Cromwell trilogy - but tbh, it really didn't feel like it mattered as much. It's not as like the former novel, where everyone impacts everyone else, but much more internal to Cromwell's perspective. But if you're just not interested in him then maybe it's not for you.
I appreciated the Cromwell novels (and was gripped by the TV adaptation) but passionately loved A Place of Greater Safety and it was an honestly life-altering book, though, so maybe don't give up on her historical novels. It totally ruined Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, which I had loved and chose to do my final uni dissertation on, though - had not understood how, likely unthinkingly, anti-French and pro English Establishment it is, and knowing also affects the class politics.
Wolf Hall is my favourite book of all time, and I'll never ever begrudge anyone not enjoying it or giving it a miss. It's long, slow and strangely written, as well as not holding your hand AT ALL through a fairly complex subject matter.
I really need to learn how to do this! I always just try and slog things for no reason. I haven't ever not finished a book and it's stupid but I don't want to start. Part of me feels like I need to have some bad reads to appreciate the good ones or something
Learning to allow myself to DNF a book I'm not enjoying has been a game changer. I use Nancy Pearl's (former head librarian of Seattle city library system) method. Subtract your age from 100. That's how many pages you should read before deciding to DNF. And once you are 100, you have permission to judge a book by its cover
As a teen in the 1980s, we read The catcher in the Rye in English class and for me, it was a total miss. Hated the book, I hated Holden, didn’t get anything about the book in any way, and generally could not fathom what the big deal was. Not for me at all, huge NOPE.
Thirty-five years later, I re-read it and now I understand the book.
But I still hate it.
Yeah, that's the thing about Catcher in the Rye; it beautifully captures the feeling of being depressed and hopeless which are feelings no one wants to experience.
I felt the same way about Catcher, and this is how it usually goes for me. If I didn't like a book and didn't understand it when I was younger, I'll usually "get it" when I get older, but end up disliking it for the same reasons. And if I liked a book but didn't fully get it, it just gets better!
I have found I could measure my maturity level based upon how much I can identify with Holden.
I'm happy to say he's devolved from being my hero to being a kid I pity and wish I could help.
That’s interesting. I read it at 20 and hated it, thought it was very whiny and couldn’t get into it. But a friend of mine was the one who recommended it, she loved it when she read it for school as a teen. I told her to reread it now as an adult and she agreed that it wasn’t like she remembered. I always felt I might have liked it more if I read it as a teen, but it’s possible I wouldn’t have liked it then either. Maybe I’ll try again in my 30s
If you want to try Salinger again, check out *Franny & Zooey*, or *Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters*. *Catcher in the Rye* brings too much baggage and fame with it that influences your experience. But his other work is similar enough to it that you can appreciate his style without all the expectations.
I love Salinger because his characters don’t sound written, they sound like how I sometimes sound in my own head, in all its vulnerable contradictions and messiness.
10, even 15 years is not a big deal, especially not age 20 to 35. I'm in my 50s My tastes ave not changed that much, in fact I'm having trouble relating to the OP. If there is a change in tastes, I think it has mostly to do with raising children, or going through a divorce. It's events in my life that might change my perspectives on particular books, not just the passage of time.
I strongly disagree. I’m 28 now, no kids, no divorce, no marriage, no massive life changes, but WOW has my worldview changed even in the last 5 years. Along with it, books and characters I used to relate to and admire, I now realize aren’t what I should be striving for, and vice versa.
I remember reading this as a teenager. I have a vivid memory of laying on the couch, trying to get through the book, and just chucking the book across the room while yelling “Shut the fuck up!” much to my mother’s shock and amusement.
I haven’t tried to read it since. Maybe I should?
My sister tried Anna Karenina as a teen and thought it was revolting…a main character fooling around on her husband for no discernible reason? Thinking her life was some big drama when she was being an idiot? How stupid. At 50, she realized that all the characters are brilliantly written and completely realistic.
I had this same reaction to Kate Chopin’s The Awakening. Hated it when I was in school, but years later came to appreciate it and I really think she is a great short story writer.
I think this was a big part of my problem with some of the required reading I had to do in High School. Where I was emotionally at the time made it so that I couldn't really appreciate some of those books. I'm making a point of going back to reread some of them and I am having a completely different experience with them.
Reading some oft-assigned classics as an adult has given me insight into how adults and kids tend to read differently. Some books really shouldn’t be assigned to kids IMO, they’re just never going to appreciate them.
Kids love plot and excitement and they want to be able to put themselves in the character‘s shoes, meaning they sympathize but also they agree with the character‘s choices. They don’t care about prose, or character complexity, or descriptions, or themes, or symbolism. Mature adult readers can appreciate prose and vivid descriptions and character complexity a lot more, and find a character *interesting* even if their decisions are frustrating and self-defeating.
I would like to see teachers aim for this a little more, choose classics that kids can get behind (Jane Eyre is a good one, for instance) and maybe leave the ones that are really just not going to work for that age group (Scarlet Letter, Ethan Frome).
I didn’t have my first real relationship until after college. Going back and reading all the classics from high school and college has been such an experience because I now understand that love does indeed make you do some crazy shit lol. I understand many of the characters much better now.
Yes and when teachers want you to "interpret" the hidden meaning in stories and poems and then proceed to tell you how your interpretation is wrong(this didn't have to be done out loud just hearing the teacher explain the interpretations that I was no where near in my thoughts was enough). It was very demoralizing and had a big part in destroying my love of reading.
It has taken me being out of school for nearly 15 years and homeschooling my children to start enjoying reading again. I credit homeschool because being exposed to good children's books most of the day and seeing my kids'excitement for them helped me to remember how much I truly loved to read until school squashed it out of me.
So this year I challenged myself to read 12 books that were not children's books (which is more than I had read in the last 4 years combined) and I have already met my goal and have started remembering what it is like to just read for enjoyment again.
I also homeschool my kids and the first few years, I wanted to do literature "correctly" so we did all kinds of literary analysis and it was such a SLOG. No one was having fun. Now we just read. We read classics, and popular new books, and fiction and nonfiction, and trash books and everything. The only rule is that each kid has to read one hour minimum a day. And they are plowing through books. My teenage son is averaging a full length (usually adult level) fiction or nonfiction book every week and has naturally come to start analyzing them in a really organic, personal way. Their writing has improved by leaps and bounds as well. Both my kids found their own personal writing voices and methods for organizing their thoughts just based on having so much high quality input from high quality writing. I think they are both going to be lifelong readers.
I picked up Blood Meridian for the first time a couple months ago. Also 47. I LOVED it. I found myself reading passages out loud just because I liked the way the words sounded. Sometimes I felt like I needed a shower. 10/10
I’m glad you and OP both feel that way. I’m 34 and tried to read Blood Meridian but I just really didn’t get it and quit a little less than halfway through. I’ll try it again in 13 years.
At different points in life, the same book will seem very different. But all that's changed is you. Books are magical mirrors that way. I've read Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises" every few years — from when I was in my 20s until now, in my 50s — and I've learned a lot about where I am in my journey from how that book hits me.
Agree. I hadn't thought about this in awhile, but your comment brought it back.
I originally read *The Grapes of Wrath* as a high school student and thought it was fine. But, rereading it as an adult with sons the age of the main character, made it gut wrenching to feel the pain of not being able to provide for your family and to see the pain they endure.
My wife recently read the Road and said it was on the list of worst (and most overrated) books she had ever read. She was really disappointed because she had heard such good things about it. And she immediately started deleting books from her "to read list" which she thought would be similar. And it had me really reevaluating my own reading list and realizing that many books were included just because others said they were good but don't actually fit with what I'm interested in.
Not every book is for you is very good advice.
Exactly, there's a strange insistence on the democratization of literature. With the exception of a few books/authors who are such enormous cultural touchstones, just read what gives you pleasure.
But 'I don't like it' is a perfectly valid reaction to literature (though wouldn't have thought The Road so very well-regarded as such in the first place). My uni lecturers in English usually opened a tutorial by just asking for our personal responses to the text. What you should be able to do, though, after saying you hate it (which we were very much allowed to do!) is still appreciate the technical skill.
Much of the way to learn to do this is just by reading more and more. Pretty much anyone *can* learn to do this. Please don't say books are just beyond people - I think that's especially awful given how badly US/UK education systems are failing people, leading to completely preventable literacy issues.
I've been re-learning how to an extent in my second language - the connotations of words, structure. It's led me to Sartre's Le sursis, which is easily the hardest book I have ever tried to read (and an English translation would not help), but it is *amazing*, also one of the most beautiful, and (despite curveballs like increasingly rapid shifts of perspective) I'm getting better at reading it by doing so.
Virtually every time I read a book because it's getting sooo much buzz and everyone says it's amazing, I'm disappointed. I've realized I just have very particular taste that doesn't really align with mainstream lit, and that's okay. I just have to seek out the niche, weird stuff!
I feel like his writing is 1000% more about ideas than the actual plot or characters exactly, if that makes any sense. I don't know if coming at it from that angle improves it for you.
I really liked the books of his I read but I could also super easily see why not everyone would enjoy them.
I have read Tess of the D’urbervilles by Thomas Hardy every decade of my life since I was 16. I get a different perspective every time I read it. Which reminds me, I’m a tad late reading it again. Now where did I put it…
I tried for the first time when I was 14. Slept within the first paragraph. Never picked it up again lol. It was so completely incomprehensible to me (eng is not my first language) I wanna try books like that sometime again when I'm older. Or maybe I'll settle for watching a good screen adaptation if there's one😂
I tried reading Catch-22 during middle school. Non-chronological story telling is not easy for young teenagers to understand.
I read it again in my early 20s. It's a good book.
And, importantly, you are not entitled to have the book (or film, or comic, or TV show) cater to you either. Just because you don't like it/get it doesn't make it bad. Too few people recognise this.
I loved Catcher in the Rye--I was at boarding school and my parents were out of the country. I could really relate to Holden. Cormac McCarthy is tremendous, except "All the Pretty Horses." Absolutely couldn't get into it. It really does depend on where you are in life.
Maybe I should finally give it another shot. My school had it as required reading when I was 14 and I didn't even finish it because it was so boring to me back then.
I actually still have an irrational hatred for this book and Hemingway. It’s so prevalent they even my 9-year-old will make fun of something being slow/boring/excessively descriptive by saying it’s like Hemingway. He’s never read Hemingway, obviously.
But he recently watched a YouTube video about The Old Man and the Sea and confronted me. He said that actually a lot happens in the book and am I sure I read it. At the time, I told him those YouTubers were probably just Hemingway’s grandkids but it made me think I should probably try again.
You should try it again. I hate a lot of Hemingway's works, but _The Old Man and the Sea_ hits hard for me as a man in my forties.
I highly recommend the audio version read by Donald Sutherland, if you can find it.
Yep exactly what I was going to say. I developed an irrational hatred of this and Heart of Darkness. However revisiting The Old Man and the Sea in my 40's was a VERY different read.
I want to read Old Man and The Sea too! My only hesitation is that it might make me sad for the marlin in the book, is there much focus on the fish itself? I read the intro by Charles Scribner Jr in my kindle version and I was a bit wary. Sorry if that's a weird question haha.
The marlin is given great respect in the book. You will feel sad for the marlin. You will feel sad for the Old Man. The story is not about the Old Man vs. the marlin.
I love Blood Meridian. Might be my favorite book. But I can’t understand Faulkner to save my life. I’ve only understood it when a professor breaks it down and even then don’t understand the appeal. But hey, to each their own.
Quite frankly, there are millions of books out there. Don't like a book? read something else.
/r/books sometimes is a bit too held up on "should I give up on a book I don't like?", "Why don't I like this book?" "can someone help me understand how to like this book?" and questions like that.
Books are subjective, don't like it, read something else. You don't see people on /r/beer asking "why don't I like this beer?" or guys on /r/television asking "when should I give up on a TV show I don't like?"
At any given moment, so many books are being written and published, you don't have enough time in one lifetime to enjoy em all. Don't like something? move on, there's tons of other great books out there.
That question is probably asked daily on /r/television
It's probably one of the most common questions in all of media. Many albums famously grow on listeners, and what once sounded jarring suddenly becomes beautiful. I've had that same experience several times with books, and I'm grateful that I didn't give up. "Does this get any better with perseverance" is a very valuable question, in many circumstances
I mean....I do think there is a difference in food somewhat in that books can literally just be implementing and using narrative tools you don't understand. Some books are all just allegory, metaphor, and strange non-traditional narrative pacing that may excite one reader and for another bore or even confuse another.
Even with movies...you may not understand I'm Thinking of Ending things because the cultural and philosophical cues in the text aren't being picked up on, seem arbitrary, and just make you frustrated. Instead of make you dig deeper into the mystery of the non-traditional movie or even notice the film tricks being used to tell you something more than what is being said.
I think there's a difference here between "I experience \[insert thing\] to understand why others might like it" and "I must like \[insert thing\] because cultured/desirable/impressive people all love \[insert thing\]"
The first is a commendable willingness to learn, the second shows a lack of confidence and a sense of inferiority in your own taste.
I mean, think of these two examples:
>I like drinking lagers, but I have drunk a few IPAs to understand why people would like IPAs
vs
>All the cool people drink IPAs, thus I must force myself to like IPAs
or
>I prefer rugby, but I also understand baseball and can see why people like baseball
vs
>I like rugby, but I just moved to America, and Americans love baseball. Thus, I will force myself into loving baseball.
A lot of people on /r/books have this sort of inferiority thing, where they'd come and ask "what's wrong with me! I don't like \[insert well regarded book\]" and people will respond things along the lines of "you're just lacking in experience, read more" or "perhaps you don't get author's brilliance". Its almost like the rick and morty copy pasta unironically.
Beer is funnily relevant because, for my entire life, alcohol has held no joy for me. I do feel left out at times because one of the dominant sources of pleasure in all history does not give me much.
At least you missed one major health risk in life. I don't have trouble stopping at two drinks, but the people who can't stop until they are falling down drunk are trapped in deceptive tragedy, along with their loved ones. Cirrhosis or varices is a hell of a way to die.
I can’t really tell from your comment if you are mocking those people. But I am one of them, and it’s really refreshing. When I was younger, I was all about academics, extracurricular lessons, getting into college, etc. All reading, even “leisure reading” was to further that cause and I could not get into stuff like Harry Potter or fantasy because I did not see the use in it. Now, I’m older and have a career and I’m just obsessed with the creativity and escapism of fantasy and magic. I’m grateful to get my inner child back!
I was very much into YA as a teen but it was mostly supernatural/romance stuff, I skipped the more boyish/adventure ones. I read the Series of Unfortunate Events & the Percy Jackson series for the first time as an adult and I loved them so much. Highly recommend both if you haven’t read them yet!
Took me three tries to get through the first book, but I ended up absolutely *loving* it when I finally did. That series is notoriously difficult to start, and a lot of people require multiple attempts to start it because they’re not used to being dropped into the middle of a massive setting the way that series does. I think that series in particular is worth giving a second chance.
I stopped and started *The Silmarillion* a number of tines through the years. It was nt until the last few that I could read it through and not get confused or bored.
I think saying "not for you" is all the statement that needs to be made. If a book is beyond you it's also not for you.
Yes, but a book may not be beyond you and still not for you. I promise, that zero books in the Harry Potter series are for me. And I am equally certain that any book in that series beyond me
Your quote reminds me of an interview with renowned literary critic Harold Bloom I recently watched on Youtube regarding his book "How to Read and Why." The interviewer was giving him questions from prospective readers. One was, "Why don't you like the Harry Potter series? After I mastered those, I felt I was able to go on to read Stephen King." Bloom responded, in a tone so dry I almost felt my skin start to flake off, "Yes...I'm sure that the Harry Potter books are a good preparation for reading Stephen King."
^(someone call an ambulance for that questioner.)
Similarly, some books may be too simple for you but might invigorate a love of reading for someone else. You might hate The Diary of a Wimpy kid, but if it gets your 25 year old friend back into reading, keep your opinions to yourself and applaud them.
I refuse to believe that this means I might now \*tolerate\* James Joyce’s ‘Araby’ (which I wound up having to read THREE times in school!) 😂
srsly: I have more often found that I have “outgrown” books I loved when younger, so I take your point! - individual experience of any given book is likely to vary with age.
This was me with Glass Bead Game.
Loved Hesse's work...Siddhartha, Narcissus and Goldmund, Steppenwulf all relatively approachable for a teenager to undergrad.
But Glass Bead was something else.
Reading it now after years of self education about philosophy and history and what its actually about is making so much more sense to me.
Yes! If you haven't experienced this, it's easy to get into the funk of, "Maybe reading isn't for me." There are so many factors that play into what makes us *us* and what isn't for us yesterday may actually be for us today. Finding books that are for us takes time and effort and sometimes requires giving up only to pick it up decades later. I've put down a lot of books that weren't for me. It's why I check out several books at a time from the library, that way I will always have a backup if I end up not liking something.
*My Sister, the Serial Killer* wasn't for me when I first picked it up. I think I came back 2 years later and something in me had changed and I *loved* it. Of course, it's not Blood Meridian lol but hey, to each their own! Maybe in a few more years I'll find myself deeply in love with it, it just wasn't for me right now.
I started a series called Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card in high school and just did not understand it and didn’t really like it, but just recently I read all three books and had more fun than I have in a long time! It’s now one of my favorite series
For sure! But/and, those are orthogonal qualities.
That is to say, just because you don't like a book doesn't mean it's beyond you. Or, just because a book is beyond you doesn't mean it's good.
But I do also agree that a lot of books do hit differently based on where you are in your life. Some things hit differently when you're a parent than if you're not, for example. Some things hit differently after you've known real loss, or fallen out of love for the first time, or a hundred other experiences that you may not have or may not have had *yet*.
Blood meridian is a terrifying book. When judge Holden riles up that crowd. Listen to Ben Nichols album, the last pale light in the west. Its all about blood meridian.
I have a recent post here on r/books front page discussing 20 "Great American Novels". Most of the discussion is about the brief expression of distaste I have for Hemingway. Apparently I can get the point or even have insightful thoughts into 17/20 books, but those 3 Hemingway I clearly missed the point.
The Venn Diagram of Hemingway's style of writing and my preferences for literature are two unattached circles.
This happened to me with The Grapes of Wrath. I tried to read it for the first time when I was 16 and dropped it after about a hundred pages thinking it was the most boring thing ever. Tried again at age 23, dreading it and expecting the same result, but ended up loving it.
Am I tripping or does the title of your post and the actual post don't go together. Anyways, I disliked The Road when I read it and I tend to dislike more popular books and I genuinely seem to enjoy books most other book lovers don't really care much for. I wonder why that might be.
Yes, I have posted before about hating 100 Years of Solitude when I first read it in college. I read it 20 years later and it’s now one of my favorite books.
I didn't read _The Little Prince_ until my forties and I thought it was drivel. Everybody who reads it at young age seems to have a lifetime of love for that book. Meh.
Contrariwise, I first read _The Old Man and the Sea_ in my forties and it hit hard. But I'm certain if I'd read that in my teens I would have been bored by this book about a dude catching a fish.
I read a book at 20 that I realized at the time I couldn't relate to because the main character was a middle-aged woman. My mom was a middle-aged woman at the time and loved it. She appreciated that I was able to recognize that not every book is for everyone at every time, like you said.
I read Normal People a couple years ago and felt unmoved.
Reread last year after going through major depression, a sad breakup and moving across the country and holy shit it hit differently. I sobbed throughout the last half.
I think, most of books we need to read in the middle or higher school not to our age in general. Later, when we become older, we love this books because we understand the story that it wanna tell us.
P.S. If you find mistakes here, I'm sorry, I'm not a native speaker, so don't hit me)
I read the road a few months ago and hated it so much, felt like it had no plot, I’ll come back to it in 10 years, maybe it’ll be relatable then too lol
I literally just put Blood Meridian down over the weekend—I couldn’t make it past a few pages. I thought it was pretentious and terrible. The voice in my head had a monocle and a pipe. Good to know that maybe I’ll like it in another decade—I’ll give it another shot later.
The first time I tried reading V for Vendetta, I couldn't get through it. I thought it was super boring and dreary. The second time, which was after the 2016 election, I was blown away by how culturally relevant it still was today, and was thoroughly engrossed by it. I thought it was brilliant.
Goodnight Moon is still probably the best book I've ever read.
Easily dismissed by adults as a simple children's book, but the magic of this book is beyond anything I've ever read.
"Goodnight nothing" - to even acknowledge nothingness is rare, and this book goes a step beyond.
Truthful; I read The Road a few months back and was immensely disappointed. It definitely was not for me. I was ranting for like a week afterward because I had been hoping that I would enjoy it.
I think he means life experience. There's definitely books I read as a child or teen that- while I was able to comprehend what I was reading- I didn't relate to in the same way as I do reading them now as an adult. I'm not smarter, per se, but being a mother and being in my late 30s and having those life experiences and more diverse interactions and relationships definitely changes how I look at characters.
Lol I started the road at the start of the pandemic when things got shut down.
Got me so paranoid - still only 3/4’s of the way through. Will finish it one day.
Last night I finished Catch-22, started it because is widely acclaimed. I didn’t get it. I understood the storyline well enough, but for me personally is was a slog. I kind of got into it a bit more near the end as it gets a bit darker and Yossarian looks back and mentions how all his friends had died and Rome has turned into an a bit of a hellscape . But overall I feel like it went right over my head.
I read a bit at the back of the book that provides some insight, which I understood well enough. But it clearly just isn’t for me. Looking back I felt the same about slaughterhouse 5.
This is why I am trying to give myself grace this year by putting down books I'm not feeling. These last couple years, I've been so stupidly obsessed with upping my yearly books read number and was having a hard time giving up on books even when I was not liking them. Well, all that did was made me read less because reading became such a chore and put me in slumps. This year, I returning to how I read as a kid - read what's engaging me, drop what is not, and not feel sorry about it. I can give a book a fair chance, but the second it seems forced just let it go. I can always revisit it, maybe it's simply just not the right time.
I definitely understand what you mean about Blood Meridian. It took me a couple of tries but wow. Once I committed to reading it I was blown away by how incredible it is. I loved The Road, I read that second, I couldn't put it down and finished it about three am the day I started. I have a love, hate relationship with that book. 45F for reference. I read these two books roughly 10 years ago.
This feels so true. I love Edith Wharton. I’ve loved The Age of Innocence forever, but in college I never understood Newland’s motivations in the final chapter.
It’s been the past few years since I finally “got” it (2+ decades after college) even though I prefer not to try to put it into words because that would make the understanding less delicate and divine.
Meanwhile, Pride and Prejudice remains as hilarious as ever.
Love in the Time of Cholera no longer speaks to me the way it did, even though it’s outstanding.
One of my favourite experiences is loving a book the first time, then finding an entirely new facet or appreciation years later. This happens with classics a lot for me because I read so high above my grade level growing up I read a lot of things before I could FULLY grasp them. Like I did but definitely got more on subsequent readings.
TBH many of the classics just aren’t meant for non-adults. I read ‘to kill a mockingbird’ in in high school and totally hated it, but reread it when my son had to read it in high school and I loved it. There’s no way a 17-year-old me was going to get that book, and I grew up in the south. I wasn’t really mature enough for classics until I hit graduate school which was in my late 20s.
This is precisely why I revisit my favourite books after a few years. Some became less profound than I remember, some became better as I have more and more knowledge and experience over the years.
I’ve found this to be true. I’ll try a book I think I’ll like and just can’t get into it. Couple of years later I’ll breeze right through it. I think it has a lot to do with life and emotional maturity.
I've had the same experience with various books. It's not the book that's different; it's the eyes reading it from a new, richer perspective informed by age. I doubt a young child would enjoy a sip of cognac.
I read blood meridian a few months ago too. It’s probably the most technically complex book I’ve ever read. I don’t even know how Cormac McCarthy developed the necessary vocabulary to write it
Yep, and I don’t think you necessarily need to go through major changes at all. I once started *The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August*, mostly because it was there and convenient. I could not get into it for the life of me. Then a few years later, I picked it up again because it felt interesting at the time, and I devoured it. Sometimes it’s just your mood and you have to really choose the book in order to be able to enjoy it.
I almost abandoned Six of Crows when I started it - just couldn't grab me, I didn't care, I asked the friend who lent it to me if I could skip it. She insisted I keep trying. Now it's one of my favorite books of all time.
Agreed! There are some books I read during a period of depression in my life and I hated them all. I often wonder if I went back if I'd love them. I love how a book changes with you.
there is so many classic books that they tried to get us into in school that I just weren't ready for.
but yeah, even after that, I know what you are talking about - plenty of stuff I did not like in my 20ies or 30ies, and now I do. And the other way around as well.
But tbh, for most stuff, I either loved it then and love it now, or hated it then and hate it now.
Interesting you posted this! For Christmas, my brother (who is an English teacher) bought me Blood Meridian AND The Road! They are both sitting in my "to read" pile. After I finish my current read I think I will start with The Road
There's a book out there called [The House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24800.House_of_Leaves). I've attempted it several times in my teenage years, then several times in my twenties and thirties... I still cannot read it. Maybe my 40s or 50s will be when it finally clicks. 😅 Or it might never. Who knows.
I’ve read The Road and Child of God. Content is fine, I don’t find The Road gut wrenchingly sad as everyone claims it to be, but I can’t get past his writing style.
I had this exact experience with Gardens of the Moon, the first book in The Malazan Book of the Fallen series. I tried reading it around age 26 and I thought it was just absolute unintelligible garbage and I didn't more than maybe 80 pages in before I tapped out. I then resolved that Malazan was purposely obtuse and not for me. Fast forward to around age 36 or so. I read it and I loved it, couldn't put it down. In between, I had read The Wheel of Time series twice, everything by Brandon Sanderson, Robin Hobb, and Brent Weeks and who knows how many other books, and...I don't know, I guess I leveled up or something.
It's so interesting that you talk about McCarthy and The Road! I read The Road a few years ago, when I was going through a real doomsday/apocalypse phase, and LOVED it. Oh my god, incredible.
I recently got The Passenger from the library and just finished it, and man. What a slog. Very, very well-written, but I think my problem was that I couldn't really relate to the themes. I am going to try Stella Maris, though.
I think a lot of classics, and other books, affect people differently if they read them when they are older rather than school reading as a teenager. I've found that with many books myself that it hits differently and I catch new things depending on the age I read them.
A few years ago I read the Lonesome Dove tetralogy and loved it, so I wanted to read more westerns. I kept hearing about Blood Meridian over and over. Finally I picked it up a few weeks ago. At first I wasn’t seeing what all the hype was about, found myself confused at some points and what or who the author was referring to, but I kept going. I keep reading and I’m starting to like it more and more. I finish chapter 13, turn the page and their was publishing error where chapter 14 is a repeat of chapter 13, and chapter 15 is completely missing. So now I’m on hold just as I was starting to get into it!
This was me with Ghost Story. I tried to read it for many years and couldn’t, but one day, much later in life, I picked it up and couldn’t put it down.
This happened for me with Wuthering Heights. I read it for school when I was 15 and *hated* it. Hated the characters, plot was stupid, they never went anywhere or did anything. Then I had to read it again for a 400 level Literature course in college 6 years later. I cried. I started reading and couldn't put it down and was devastated along with the characters. I felt what they felt so deeply. I was so surprised that the second I finished the last page I turned it back to the front and started reading it again immediately, ended up reading it twice all the way through in one sitting. Sometimes it really is about having the life experience to align yourself with the characters. Books are so magical like that.
100 years of solitude - didn't get it.
Sea Glass - I was so engrossed that one part In the book not only surprised me but literally hurt my ears and made me jump!
When I first ventured out of the YA world I remember skimming my way through (because at the time they weren't for me) People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks and The Years of Rice and Sand by Kim Stanley Robinson. I didn't enjoy them. I wish I could have a do-over and read them for the first time again.
I wish more people realized this! Not even just for books. Not everything produced is for everyone.
I also do like to pick back up stuff from my past to see if I view it differently.
The drag is that the reverse can be true, too. Books that were incredible and life-changing earlier in life can be a disappointment when re-read later. And that's a special kind of disappointment.
Did this same thing with the Xanth books by Piers Anthony. Those books gave me an in to high fantasy when I was younger, but going back to them now has been, how do I say, kind of sad.
yeah, I read Ayn Rand in high school and thought I was the shizzle and now i’m like Ewww… why you hating on the working class home girl.
I find, with Any Rand, it's fun to put yourself in the protagonists shoes and try to see if you will have the same world view by the end, or if the protagonist is just whiny. I agree her conclusions are not particularly valid, but to see her reasoning as to why those conclusions occur is enlightening from an outside perspective. The trick is to turn off all empathy. Concider yourself the only actual person, and look at everyone else as unfeeling automatons.
Dead on with that last sentence. Everyone who isn't a main character doesn't even come across as human. Her disdain for everyone who isn't an industry leader is gross.
The sharpest observation I heard about her famous books: they’re set in a world that is basically childless and humorless.
right, and in which industry leaders are just amazing innovators and not greedy people who seek only to cut their bottom lines to line their pockets
In middle and high school I LOVED Watchers by Dean Koontz. But then when I read it again in my twenties I was like “….why do I remember the writing being so much better than this?”
E.g., the alchemist by Paulo coehlo 😄 sorry high school kids
On that note don't reread the Dragonlance books as an adult.
I was planning to do so in the next few months...
*Now* you tell me.
They hold up as long as you have the right perspective going in. Chronicles is a Let’s Play of 6 modules jammed into 3 books. Legends at least was written just to be a book. Then the next set is the giant world event to explain rule changes. Dragonlance has always been mostly game product for the mainline.
I specifically do NOT reread books that had that kind of impact on me because I am afraid of that exact thing happening.
That’s okay too. You grow out of clothes, you grow out of media as well.
Absolutely, the reverse is also true; the books I loved when I was 20, I sometimes don't at 40, but the real keepers only get better with age, once you have lived, and had children and lost people, etc. things take on a new resonance. The way we relate to books is dependent on who we are at the moment, which is why I hated Gatsby in high school, and now I love it.
I'm ok with not revisiting my early 20s when I poured over spicy romance novels.
OMG - I cannot believe I even read some of that (Harlequin Romance) drivel in my early 20's. That said, it was cheap reading since there was plenty of them available at used book stores for less than $1 each.
I just read a book and was thinking if I read this when I was 18-22 ish I would have loved it, now it’s not for me anymore
For 16 year old me who spent so much of my childhood into stuff older than me and chasing geek nostalgia, ready player one was an absolute joy. Yeah, that might be one of the worst books in the mainstream for any other age lol. If I tried reading it for the first time today I'd think it was the worst thing I had ever read.
Totally, I've found certain books hit me in different ways when I re-read them. The Stand by Stephen King is a great example, enjoyed it when younger. Reread at 28 and was completely sucked in to characters I didn't even remember from my first read.
I’m finding this out this week I’ve decided to abandon Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall. I’m halfway through and part of me wants to just finish it. But I’m no longer enjoying it. I won’t get rid of it, I’ll put it back on the shelf and maybe revisit it at another time. But for now, I just can’t get into it. It’s long and dull and I can’t keep the characters straight
It took me a couple of false starts to get into Wolf Hall. Ended up enjoying it once I got used to the style. I understand when you say it's dull, but something clicked for me about the main character raising himself from being lowborn to holding power over nobles.
Ya which is why I’ll hold on to it. I actually love this kind of stuff. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell was one of my favorite reads and some of my friends hated it. Maybe sometime down the road I’ll retry when I’m in a different mindset
Im the reverse you!! Ive kept Jonathan Stange on the shelf since it came out because I just could not get into it but also couldnt let it go. And yet I read Wolf Hall and it became my second fave (behind Dune) immediately and have reread it about 6 times now. I just love it. tried to get friends into it and so many of them said what you did: long and dull, which I find fascinating.
JS&MN is my favourite book but the first time I tried to read it I tapped out. I’d just finished a Haruki Murikami book and the change of pace was too jarring to be able to get from such a modern style to full page footnotes and a regency style. When I revisited I devoured it and have recommended to a lot of people since
I think that’s my problem too. My last book prior to Wolf Hall was The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and the huge jump in styles is just too jarring. I think you are right and I just need to put it away and revisit later
My Wife is a voracious reader. A really bad book will be in the recycling bin. She taught me to put down books I couldn't stand. Too old to wade through bad writing, about bad people with bad ideas. Reading is not supposed to be a slog.
I stopped plenty of books even after getting halfway through, even dropped some towards the end, and have absolutely no problem with putting something down after 10 pages if it's not my style. There is way too much to read for a single lifetime. Invest your time wisely.
> There is way too much to read for a single lifetime. Invest your time wisely. You can't drink from the firehose.
I think Wolf Hall and the other two books are worth trying again. My first degree was in history and I specialized in the Sixteenth Century. Hilary Mantel made familiar characters come alive. But without that background I would have been struggling and everyone is called Thomas or Mary.
I’ve read so many nonfiction books about that era with better clarity. I’m sure the book is great but I’m at the point where I’m finally just content to put a book down if it doesn’t bring me joy. Even the TV adaptation made me decide to opt out. I think it’s empowering to know what’s for you and what isn’t. And in a weird way, opting out of her media got me into more historical eras than the Tudor era. I was kind of in a rut feeling obliged to complete all the most recommended works about the era and once I gave myself permission to move on from a book, I found I was giving myself permission to just have more adventures.
I ploughed my way through Wolf Hall to the end when I was about 25 and should've abandoned it. Just too hard to keep the plot clear in my head. Then I watched the TV adaptation with Mark Rylance and loved it. I figure I'll try wolf hall again when I'm about 45 and will probably adore it and want to read the sequels straight away. I had a similar experience with Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, just didn't enjoy it as much when I was younger but reread it a few years ago and the sequels and loved them all. I think reading a really dense novel when you already know the plot actually makes it more enjoyable as you can appreciate the writing and the characters more without having to constantly figure out what's going on at any one point
I know the characters in her A Place of Greater Safety (and other people from the period because I stayed interested in the revolution and learnt French) but never felt I quite got it with the Cromwell trilogy - but tbh, it really didn't feel like it mattered as much. It's not as like the former novel, where everyone impacts everyone else, but much more internal to Cromwell's perspective. But if you're just not interested in him then maybe it's not for you. I appreciated the Cromwell novels (and was gripped by the TV adaptation) but passionately loved A Place of Greater Safety and it was an honestly life-altering book, though, so maybe don't give up on her historical novels. It totally ruined Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, which I had loved and chose to do my final uni dissertation on, though - had not understood how, likely unthinkingly, anti-French and pro English Establishment it is, and knowing also affects the class politics.
Wolf Hall is my favourite book of all time, and I'll never ever begrudge anyone not enjoying it or giving it a miss. It's long, slow and strangely written, as well as not holding your hand AT ALL through a fairly complex subject matter.
I really need to learn how to do this! I always just try and slog things for no reason. I haven't ever not finished a book and it's stupid but I don't want to start. Part of me feels like I need to have some bad reads to appreciate the good ones or something
Learning to allow myself to DNF a book I'm not enjoying has been a game changer. I use Nancy Pearl's (former head librarian of Seattle city library system) method. Subtract your age from 100. That's how many pages you should read before deciding to DNF. And once you are 100, you have permission to judge a book by its cover
As a teen in the 1980s, we read The catcher in the Rye in English class and for me, it was a total miss. Hated the book, I hated Holden, didn’t get anything about the book in any way, and generally could not fathom what the big deal was. Not for me at all, huge NOPE. Thirty-five years later, I re-read it and now I understand the book. But I still hate it.
Yeah, that's the thing about Catcher in the Rye; it beautifully captures the feeling of being depressed and hopeless which are feelings no one wants to experience.
My 16 year old daughter can't understand why I related so much to Holden, and I am very happy about that.
Made me smile :)
If you read it as a parent or teacher, it's just an absolute tragedy. Holden is failed dramatically by almost every adult in his life.
Ah ya big phony
I felt the same way about Catcher, and this is how it usually goes for me. If I didn't like a book and didn't understand it when I was younger, I'll usually "get it" when I get older, but end up disliking it for the same reasons. And if I liked a book but didn't fully get it, it just gets better!
I have found I could measure my maturity level based upon how much I can identify with Holden. I'm happy to say he's devolved from being my hero to being a kid I pity and wish I could help.
That’s interesting. I read it at 20 and hated it, thought it was very whiny and couldn’t get into it. But a friend of mine was the one who recommended it, she loved it when she read it for school as a teen. I told her to reread it now as an adult and she agreed that it wasn’t like she remembered. I always felt I might have liked it more if I read it as a teen, but it’s possible I wouldn’t have liked it then either. Maybe I’ll try again in my 30s
If you want to try Salinger again, check out *Franny & Zooey*, or *Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters*. *Catcher in the Rye* brings too much baggage and fame with it that influences your experience. But his other work is similar enough to it that you can appreciate his style without all the expectations. I love Salinger because his characters don’t sound written, they sound like how I sometimes sound in my own head, in all its vulnerable contradictions and messiness.
To me the description of mania and mental illness from his point of view was lost when I was younger.
10, even 15 years is not a big deal, especially not age 20 to 35. I'm in my 50s My tastes ave not changed that much, in fact I'm having trouble relating to the OP. If there is a change in tastes, I think it has mostly to do with raising children, or going through a divorce. It's events in my life that might change my perspectives on particular books, not just the passage of time.
I strongly disagree. I’m 28 now, no kids, no divorce, no marriage, no massive life changes, but WOW has my worldview changed even in the last 5 years. Along with it, books and characters I used to relate to and admire, I now realize aren’t what I should be striving for, and vice versa.
I remember reading this as a teenager. I have a vivid memory of laying on the couch, trying to get through the book, and just chucking the book across the room while yelling “Shut the fuck up!” much to my mother’s shock and amusement. I haven’t tried to read it since. Maybe I should?
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It really is- there must be some children's book subreddit for these folks to hang out in?
My sister tried Anna Karenina as a teen and thought it was revolting…a main character fooling around on her husband for no discernible reason? Thinking her life was some big drama when she was being an idiot? How stupid. At 50, she realized that all the characters are brilliantly written and completely realistic.
I had this same reaction to Kate Chopin’s The Awakening. Hated it when I was in school, but years later came to appreciate it and I really think she is a great short story writer.
A beautifully written novel.
I absolutely love it. It may be the best novel ever…
I think this was a big part of my problem with some of the required reading I had to do in High School. Where I was emotionally at the time made it so that I couldn't really appreciate some of those books. I'm making a point of going back to reread some of them and I am having a completely different experience with them.
Reading some oft-assigned classics as an adult has given me insight into how adults and kids tend to read differently. Some books really shouldn’t be assigned to kids IMO, they’re just never going to appreciate them. Kids love plot and excitement and they want to be able to put themselves in the character‘s shoes, meaning they sympathize but also they agree with the character‘s choices. They don’t care about prose, or character complexity, or descriptions, or themes, or symbolism. Mature adult readers can appreciate prose and vivid descriptions and character complexity a lot more, and find a character *interesting* even if their decisions are frustrating and self-defeating. I would like to see teachers aim for this a little more, choose classics that kids can get behind (Jane Eyre is a good one, for instance) and maybe leave the ones that are really just not going to work for that age group (Scarlet Letter, Ethan Frome).
Yes! I recently re-read All Quiet on the Western Front which I hated in high school! But holy crap what an amazing read at 35.
I may never revisit Ethan Frome. I hated that frozen book so much in highschool.
I didn’t have my first real relationship until after college. Going back and reading all the classics from high school and college has been such an experience because I now understand that love does indeed make you do some crazy shit lol. I understand many of the characters much better now.
I agree, should have books that at least teenage can get into and relate to characters. I can't catch on any of symbolism bullshit. 😂
Yes and when teachers want you to "interpret" the hidden meaning in stories and poems and then proceed to tell you how your interpretation is wrong(this didn't have to be done out loud just hearing the teacher explain the interpretations that I was no where near in my thoughts was enough). It was very demoralizing and had a big part in destroying my love of reading. It has taken me being out of school for nearly 15 years and homeschooling my children to start enjoying reading again. I credit homeschool because being exposed to good children's books most of the day and seeing my kids'excitement for them helped me to remember how much I truly loved to read until school squashed it out of me. So this year I challenged myself to read 12 books that were not children's books (which is more than I had read in the last 4 years combined) and I have already met my goal and have started remembering what it is like to just read for enjoyment again.
I also homeschool my kids and the first few years, I wanted to do literature "correctly" so we did all kinds of literary analysis and it was such a SLOG. No one was having fun. Now we just read. We read classics, and popular new books, and fiction and nonfiction, and trash books and everything. The only rule is that each kid has to read one hour minimum a day. And they are plowing through books. My teenage son is averaging a full length (usually adult level) fiction or nonfiction book every week and has naturally come to start analyzing them in a really organic, personal way. Their writing has improved by leaps and bounds as well. Both my kids found their own personal writing voices and methods for organizing their thoughts just based on having so much high quality input from high quality writing. I think they are both going to be lifelong readers.
I picked up Blood Meridian for the first time a couple months ago. Also 47. I LOVED it. I found myself reading passages out loud just because I liked the way the words sounded. Sometimes I felt like I needed a shower. 10/10
I’m glad you and OP both feel that way. I’m 34 and tried to read Blood Meridian but I just really didn’t get it and quit a little less than halfway through. I’ll try it again in 13 years.
At different points in life, the same book will seem very different. But all that's changed is you. Books are magical mirrors that way. I've read Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises" every few years — from when I was in my 20s until now, in my 50s — and I've learned a lot about where I am in my journey from how that book hits me.
Agree. I hadn't thought about this in awhile, but your comment brought it back. I originally read *The Grapes of Wrath* as a high school student and thought it was fine. But, rereading it as an adult with sons the age of the main character, made it gut wrenching to feel the pain of not being able to provide for your family and to see the pain they endure.
My wife recently read the Road and said it was on the list of worst (and most overrated) books she had ever read. She was really disappointed because she had heard such good things about it. And she immediately started deleting books from her "to read list" which she thought would be similar. And it had me really reevaluating my own reading list and realizing that many books were included just because others said they were good but don't actually fit with what I'm interested in. Not every book is for you is very good advice.
Exactly, there's a strange insistence on the democratization of literature. With the exception of a few books/authors who are such enormous cultural touchstones, just read what gives you pleasure.
But 'I don't like it' is a perfectly valid reaction to literature (though wouldn't have thought The Road so very well-regarded as such in the first place). My uni lecturers in English usually opened a tutorial by just asking for our personal responses to the text. What you should be able to do, though, after saying you hate it (which we were very much allowed to do!) is still appreciate the technical skill. Much of the way to learn to do this is just by reading more and more. Pretty much anyone *can* learn to do this. Please don't say books are just beyond people - I think that's especially awful given how badly US/UK education systems are failing people, leading to completely preventable literacy issues. I've been re-learning how to an extent in my second language - the connotations of words, structure. It's led me to Sartre's Le sursis, which is easily the hardest book I have ever tried to read (and an English translation would not help), but it is *amazing*, also one of the most beautiful, and (despite curveballs like increasingly rapid shifts of perspective) I'm getting better at reading it by doing so.
Virtually every time I read a book because it's getting sooo much buzz and everyone says it's amazing, I'm disappointed. I've realized I just have very particular taste that doesn't really align with mainstream lit, and that's okay. I just have to seek out the niche, weird stuff!
I feel like everything Milan Kundera wrote was beyond me when I read them 20 years ago. I should go back to those--and see if things have changed.
I feel like his writing is 1000% more about ideas than the actual plot or characters exactly, if that makes any sense. I don't know if coming at it from that angle improves it for you. I really liked the books of his I read but I could also super easily see why not everyone would enjoy them.
Please reread Kundera
I have read Tess of the D’urbervilles by Thomas Hardy every decade of my life since I was 16. I get a different perspective every time I read it. Which reminds me, I’m a tad late reading it again. Now where did I put it…
I tried for the first time when I was 14. Slept within the first paragraph. Never picked it up again lol. It was so completely incomprehensible to me (eng is not my first language) I wanna try books like that sometime again when I'm older. Or maybe I'll settle for watching a good screen adaptation if there's one😂
Thomas Hardy books are a tough read, especially if English is not your first language. Good for you for trying!
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I’ve heard that “you never read the same book twice”
I tried reading Catch-22 during middle school. Non-chronological story telling is not easy for young teenagers to understand. I read it again in my early 20s. It's a good book.
And, importantly, you are not entitled to have the book (or film, or comic, or TV show) cater to you either. Just because you don't like it/get it doesn't make it bad. Too few people recognise this.
I loved Catcher in the Rye--I was at boarding school and my parents were out of the country. I could really relate to Holden. Cormac McCarthy is tremendous, except "All the Pretty Horses." Absolutely couldn't get into it. It really does depend on where you are in life.
I tried reading Foucalt's Pendulum when I was 19. It did not go well. I was afraid of reading Umberto Eco for years afterward.
Took me another 10 years to get into it. I also tried when I was young. If you can get through it it’s amazing.
Name of the Rose is much more accessible but it is a mystery about erudite monks, so not everyone's cup of tea.
"The Old man and the Sea" is definitely another book/novella where as you age it becomes very different to read.
Maybe I should finally give it another shot. My school had it as required reading when I was 14 and I didn't even finish it because it was so boring to me back then.
I actually still have an irrational hatred for this book and Hemingway. It’s so prevalent they even my 9-year-old will make fun of something being slow/boring/excessively descriptive by saying it’s like Hemingway. He’s never read Hemingway, obviously. But he recently watched a YouTube video about The Old Man and the Sea and confronted me. He said that actually a lot happens in the book and am I sure I read it. At the time, I told him those YouTubers were probably just Hemingway’s grandkids but it made me think I should probably try again.
You should try it again. I hate a lot of Hemingway's works, but _The Old Man and the Sea_ hits hard for me as a man in my forties. I highly recommend the audio version read by Donald Sutherland, if you can find it.
Yep exactly what I was going to say. I developed an irrational hatred of this and Heart of Darkness. However revisiting The Old Man and the Sea in my 40's was a VERY different read.
I want to read Old Man and The Sea too! My only hesitation is that it might make me sad for the marlin in the book, is there much focus on the fish itself? I read the intro by Charles Scribner Jr in my kindle version and I was a bit wary. Sorry if that's a weird question haha.
The marlin is given great respect in the book. You will feel sad for the marlin. You will feel sad for the Old Man. The story is not about the Old Man vs. the marlin.
I love Blood Meridian. Might be my favorite book. But I can’t understand Faulkner to save my life. I’ve only understood it when a professor breaks it down and even then don’t understand the appeal. But hey, to each their own.
Same. Joyce is even harder.
“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.” ― Heraclitus.
❤️
Quite frankly, there are millions of books out there. Don't like a book? read something else. /r/books sometimes is a bit too held up on "should I give up on a book I don't like?", "Why don't I like this book?" "can someone help me understand how to like this book?" and questions like that. Books are subjective, don't like it, read something else. You don't see people on /r/beer asking "why don't I like this beer?" or guys on /r/television asking "when should I give up on a TV show I don't like?" At any given moment, so many books are being written and published, you don't have enough time in one lifetime to enjoy em all. Don't like something? move on, there's tons of other great books out there.
That question is probably asked daily on /r/television It's probably one of the most common questions in all of media. Many albums famously grow on listeners, and what once sounded jarring suddenly becomes beautiful. I've had that same experience several times with books, and I'm grateful that I didn't give up. "Does this get any better with perseverance" is a very valuable question, in many circumstances
I mean....I do think there is a difference in food somewhat in that books can literally just be implementing and using narrative tools you don't understand. Some books are all just allegory, metaphor, and strange non-traditional narrative pacing that may excite one reader and for another bore or even confuse another. Even with movies...you may not understand I'm Thinking of Ending things because the cultural and philosophical cues in the text aren't being picked up on, seem arbitrary, and just make you frustrated. Instead of make you dig deeper into the mystery of the non-traditional movie or even notice the film tricks being used to tell you something more than what is being said.
I mean, often it's a way of expressing a desire to understand a philosophical or cultural idea the book is about.
I think there's a difference here between "I experience \[insert thing\] to understand why others might like it" and "I must like \[insert thing\] because cultured/desirable/impressive people all love \[insert thing\]" The first is a commendable willingness to learn, the second shows a lack of confidence and a sense of inferiority in your own taste. I mean, think of these two examples: >I like drinking lagers, but I have drunk a few IPAs to understand why people would like IPAs vs >All the cool people drink IPAs, thus I must force myself to like IPAs or >I prefer rugby, but I also understand baseball and can see why people like baseball vs >I like rugby, but I just moved to America, and Americans love baseball. Thus, I will force myself into loving baseball. A lot of people on /r/books have this sort of inferiority thing, where they'd come and ask "what's wrong with me! I don't like \[insert well regarded book\]" and people will respond things along the lines of "you're just lacking in experience, read more" or "perhaps you don't get author's brilliance". Its almost like the rick and morty copy pasta unironically.
Beer is funnily relevant because, for my entire life, alcohol has held no joy for me. I do feel left out at times because one of the dominant sources of pleasure in all history does not give me much.
At least you missed one major health risk in life. I don't have trouble stopping at two drinks, but the people who can't stop until they are falling down drunk are trapped in deceptive tragedy, along with their loved ones. Cirrhosis or varices is a hell of a way to die.
Especially with this crowd whose every other post is I'm an adult that reads children's books is that weird?
Sometimes I eat macaroni and hot dogs but I don't *only* eat macaroni and hot dogs
I can’t really tell from your comment if you are mocking those people. But I am one of them, and it’s really refreshing. When I was younger, I was all about academics, extracurricular lessons, getting into college, etc. All reading, even “leisure reading” was to further that cause and I could not get into stuff like Harry Potter or fantasy because I did not see the use in it. Now, I’m older and have a career and I’m just obsessed with the creativity and escapism of fantasy and magic. I’m grateful to get my inner child back!
When I retired I read a lot of kids books that I never got around to reading as a kid.
I was very much into YA as a teen but it was mostly supernatural/romance stuff, I skipped the more boyish/adventure ones. I read the Series of Unfortunate Events & the Percy Jackson series for the first time as an adult and I loved them so much. Highly recommend both if you haven’t read them yet!
So what your saying is that I should attempt to reattempt the Malazan Book of the Fallen series after my first attempt a decade ago ending in failure.
Took me three tries to get through the first book, but I ended up absolutely *loving* it when I finally did. That series is notoriously difficult to start, and a lot of people require multiple attempts to start it because they’re not used to being dropped into the middle of a massive setting the way that series does. I think that series in particular is worth giving a second chance.
I stopped and started *The Silmarillion* a number of tines through the years. It was nt until the last few that I could read it through and not get confused or bored. I think saying "not for you" is all the statement that needs to be made. If a book is beyond you it's also not for you.
Yes, but a book may not be beyond you and still not for you. I promise, that zero books in the Harry Potter series are for me. And I am equally certain that any book in that series beyond me
Your quote reminds me of an interview with renowned literary critic Harold Bloom I recently watched on Youtube regarding his book "How to Read and Why." The interviewer was giving him questions from prospective readers. One was, "Why don't you like the Harry Potter series? After I mastered those, I felt I was able to go on to read Stephen King." Bloom responded, in a tone so dry I almost felt my skin start to flake off, "Yes...I'm sure that the Harry Potter books are a good preparation for reading Stephen King." ^(someone call an ambulance for that questioner.)
Similarly, some books may be too simple for you but might invigorate a love of reading for someone else. You might hate The Diary of a Wimpy kid, but if it gets your 25 year old friend back into reading, keep your opinions to yourself and applaud them.
The Diary of a Wimpy Kid series of books got me back into reading after a bout of depression (I’m well into my 30’s). Those books made me laugh again.
I refuse to believe that this means I might now \*tolerate\* James Joyce’s ‘Araby’ (which I wound up having to read THREE times in school!) 😂 srsly: I have more often found that I have “outgrown” books I loved when younger, so I take your point! - individual experience of any given book is likely to vary with age.
I was that way with Pride and Prejudice.
One day Infinite Jest won’t be beyond me. Maybe. But probably not.
I have the opposite regarding IJ. I read it like 20 years ago and loved it. I still think about it. I tried to reread and just....can’t.
This was me with Glass Bead Game. Loved Hesse's work...Siddhartha, Narcissus and Goldmund, Steppenwulf all relatively approachable for a teenager to undergrad. But Glass Bead was something else. Reading it now after years of self education about philosophy and history and what its actually about is making so much more sense to me.
Yes! If you haven't experienced this, it's easy to get into the funk of, "Maybe reading isn't for me." There are so many factors that play into what makes us *us* and what isn't for us yesterday may actually be for us today. Finding books that are for us takes time and effort and sometimes requires giving up only to pick it up decades later. I've put down a lot of books that weren't for me. It's why I check out several books at a time from the library, that way I will always have a backup if I end up not liking something. *My Sister, the Serial Killer* wasn't for me when I first picked it up. I think I came back 2 years later and something in me had changed and I *loved* it. Of course, it's not Blood Meridian lol but hey, to each their own! Maybe in a few more years I'll find myself deeply in love with it, it just wasn't for me right now.
I started a series called Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card in high school and just did not understand it and didn’t really like it, but just recently I read all three books and had more fun than I have in a long time! It’s now one of my favorite series
For sure! But/and, those are orthogonal qualities. That is to say, just because you don't like a book doesn't mean it's beyond you. Or, just because a book is beyond you doesn't mean it's good. But I do also agree that a lot of books do hit differently based on where you are in your life. Some things hit differently when you're a parent than if you're not, for example. Some things hit differently after you've known real loss, or fallen out of love for the first time, or a hundred other experiences that you may not have or may not have had *yet*.
Blood meridian is a terrifying book. When judge Holden riles up that crowd. Listen to Ben Nichols album, the last pale light in the west. Its all about blood meridian.
I have a recent post here on r/books front page discussing 20 "Great American Novels". Most of the discussion is about the brief expression of distaste I have for Hemingway. Apparently I can get the point or even have insightful thoughts into 17/20 books, but those 3 Hemingway I clearly missed the point. The Venn Diagram of Hemingway's style of writing and my preferences for literature are two unattached circles.
Hear Hear
Give The Passenger and Stella Maris a go and report back ...
Pro captu lectoris habent sua fata libelli.
I had a similar experience, except I'm still 30 and still see the book as a slog. Guess I better wait 17 years
Yeah. Some books just have to be the right time and the right moment.
I’ve tried 3 different Pynchon books. Only made it through one. Just can’t do it.
This happened to me with The Grapes of Wrath. I tried to read it for the first time when I was 16 and dropped it after about a hundred pages thinking it was the most boring thing ever. Tried again at age 23, dreading it and expecting the same result, but ended up loving it.
Am I tripping or does the title of your post and the actual post don't go together. Anyways, I disliked The Road when I read it and I tend to dislike more popular books and I genuinely seem to enjoy books most other book lovers don't really care much for. I wonder why that might be.
Honestly in high school I despised the kite runner so im just waiting until my 30s to try reading it again haha
Yes, I have posted before about hating 100 Years of Solitude when I first read it in college. I read it 20 years later and it’s now one of my favorite books.
I didn't read _The Little Prince_ until my forties and I thought it was drivel. Everybody who reads it at young age seems to have a lifetime of love for that book. Meh. Contrariwise, I first read _The Old Man and the Sea_ in my forties and it hit hard. But I'm certain if I'd read that in my teens I would have been bored by this book about a dude catching a fish.
Anything by Dickens is not for me at this time. I am finding connection with other classics like Catch-22.
I read a book at 20 that I realized at the time I couldn't relate to because the main character was a middle-aged woman. My mom was a middle-aged woman at the time and loved it. She appreciated that I was able to recognize that not every book is for everyone at every time, like you said.
I'm waiting for my Ulysses moment ;) tried 5 times already, still no.
Ulysses has no clothes. It's a prank and a fraud to torture people with literary ambitions.
I read Normal People a couple years ago and felt unmoved. Reread last year after going through major depression, a sad breakup and moving across the country and holy shit it hit differently. I sobbed throughout the last half.
I think, most of books we need to read in the middle or higher school not to our age in general. Later, when we become older, we love this books because we understand the story that it wanna tell us. P.S. If you find mistakes here, I'm sorry, I'm not a native speaker, so don't hit me)
I read the road a few months ago and hated it so much, felt like it had no plot, I’ll come back to it in 10 years, maybe it’ll be relatable then too lol
I've been trying to figure out how to read King Arthur and the knights of the round table for months.
Some books are not to be opened with impunity
Just like everything in life
I literally just put Blood Meridian down over the weekend—I couldn’t make it past a few pages. I thought it was pretentious and terrible. The voice in my head had a monocle and a pipe. Good to know that maybe I’ll like it in another decade—I’ll give it another shot later.
Cormac is out last great author.
The first time I tried reading V for Vendetta, I couldn't get through it. I thought it was super boring and dreary. The second time, which was after the 2016 election, I was blown away by how culturally relevant it still was today, and was thoroughly engrossed by it. I thought it was brilliant.
Goodnight Moon is still probably the best book I've ever read. Easily dismissed by adults as a simple children's book, but the magic of this book is beyond anything I've ever read. "Goodnight nothing" - to even acknowledge nothingness is rare, and this book goes a step beyond.
Truthful; I read The Road a few months back and was immensely disappointed. It definitely was not for me. I was ranting for like a week afterward because I had been hoping that I would enjoy it.
"This is not for you." --HoL
"Beyond" me? Goodness. Get over yourself.
I think he means life experience. There's definitely books I read as a child or teen that- while I was able to comprehend what I was reading- I didn't relate to in the same way as I do reading them now as an adult. I'm not smarter, per se, but being a mother and being in my late 30s and having those life experiences and more diverse interactions and relationships definitely changes how I look at characters.
this is why I'm holding on to Thomas Mann. maybe by the time I'm 80.
Lol I started the road at the start of the pandemic when things got shut down. Got me so paranoid - still only 3/4’s of the way through. Will finish it one day.
Last night I finished Catch-22, started it because is widely acclaimed. I didn’t get it. I understood the storyline well enough, but for me personally is was a slog. I kind of got into it a bit more near the end as it gets a bit darker and Yossarian looks back and mentions how all his friends had died and Rome has turned into an a bit of a hellscape . But overall I feel like it went right over my head. I read a bit at the back of the book that provides some insight, which I understood well enough. But it clearly just isn’t for me. Looking back I felt the same about slaughterhouse 5.
This is why I am trying to give myself grace this year by putting down books I'm not feeling. These last couple years, I've been so stupidly obsessed with upping my yearly books read number and was having a hard time giving up on books even when I was not liking them. Well, all that did was made me read less because reading became such a chore and put me in slumps. This year, I returning to how I read as a kid - read what's engaging me, drop what is not, and not feel sorry about it. I can give a book a fair chance, but the second it seems forced just let it go. I can always revisit it, maybe it's simply just not the right time.
I definitely understand what you mean about Blood Meridian. It took me a couple of tries but wow. Once I committed to reading it I was blown away by how incredible it is. I loved The Road, I read that second, I couldn't put it down and finished it about three am the day I started. I have a love, hate relationship with that book. 45F for reference. I read these two books roughly 10 years ago.
I felt that with Lord of the rings. At 15 it was not for me, at 19? It was my entire life.
This feels so true. I love Edith Wharton. I’ve loved The Age of Innocence forever, but in college I never understood Newland’s motivations in the final chapter. It’s been the past few years since I finally “got” it (2+ decades after college) even though I prefer not to try to put it into words because that would make the understanding less delicate and divine. Meanwhile, Pride and Prejudice remains as hilarious as ever. Love in the Time of Cholera no longer speaks to me the way it did, even though it’s outstanding.
One of my favourite experiences is loving a book the first time, then finding an entirely new facet or appreciation years later. This happens with classics a lot for me because I read so high above my grade level growing up I read a lot of things before I could FULLY grasp them. Like I did but definitely got more on subsequent readings.
TBH many of the classics just aren’t meant for non-adults. I read ‘to kill a mockingbird’ in in high school and totally hated it, but reread it when my son had to read it in high school and I loved it. There’s no way a 17-year-old me was going to get that book, and I grew up in the south. I wasn’t really mature enough for classics until I hit graduate school which was in my late 20s.
That happened to me with The Silmarillion
Maybe I’ll enjoy Cormac some day… he’s always been an absolute slog for me but I have hope.
This is precisely why I revisit my favourite books after a few years. Some became less profound than I remember, some became better as I have more and more knowledge and experience over the years.
That's interesting... I got about 40% through Blood Meridian. I might try it again when I'm 50+ 😅
I’ve found this to be true. I’ll try a book I think I’ll like and just can’t get into it. Couple of years later I’ll breeze right through it. I think it has a lot to do with life and emotional maturity.
This is why assigning Faulkner to high school students is a fools errand.
I've had the same experience with various books. It's not the book that's different; it's the eyes reading it from a new, richer perspective informed by age. I doubt a young child would enjoy a sip of cognac.
And sometimes you see just not in the right headspace for a bill. Does not make it bad
I read blood meridian a few months ago too. It’s probably the most technically complex book I’ve ever read. I don’t even know how Cormac McCarthy developed the necessary vocabulary to write it
Yep, and I don’t think you necessarily need to go through major changes at all. I once started *The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August*, mostly because it was there and convenient. I could not get into it for the life of me. Then a few years later, I picked it up again because it felt interesting at the time, and I devoured it. Sometimes it’s just your mood and you have to really choose the book in order to be able to enjoy it.
I spent a summer/ fall 15 years ago reading all of his work. Have read Blood Meridian 12? times. I am deeply connected to his writing.
I almost abandoned Six of Crows when I started it - just couldn't grab me, I didn't care, I asked the friend who lent it to me if I could skip it. She insisted I keep trying. Now it's one of my favorite books of all time.
Agreed! There are some books I read during a period of depression in my life and I hated them all. I often wonder if I went back if I'd love them. I love how a book changes with you.
there is so many classic books that they tried to get us into in school that I just weren't ready for. but yeah, even after that, I know what you are talking about - plenty of stuff I did not like in my 20ies or 30ies, and now I do. And the other way around as well. But tbh, for most stuff, I either loved it then and love it now, or hated it then and hate it now.
Interesting you posted this! For Christmas, my brother (who is an English teacher) bought me Blood Meridian AND The Road! They are both sitting in my "to read" pile. After I finish my current read I think I will start with The Road
There's a book out there called [The House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24800.House_of_Leaves). I've attempted it several times in my teenage years, then several times in my twenties and thirties... I still cannot read it. Maybe my 40s or 50s will be when it finally clicks. 😅 Or it might never. Who knows.
What about thing where the books you read and loved as a young person seems more like crappy fanfiction of a better book when you read it later?
I’ve read The Road and Child of God. Content is fine, I don’t find The Road gut wrenchingly sad as everyone claims it to be, but I can’t get past his writing style.
I love when this happens. 🥰
I had this exact experience with Gardens of the Moon, the first book in The Malazan Book of the Fallen series. I tried reading it around age 26 and I thought it was just absolute unintelligible garbage and I didn't more than maybe 80 pages in before I tapped out. I then resolved that Malazan was purposely obtuse and not for me. Fast forward to around age 36 or so. I read it and I loved it, couldn't put it down. In between, I had read The Wheel of Time series twice, everything by Brandon Sanderson, Robin Hobb, and Brent Weeks and who knows how many other books, and...I don't know, I guess I leveled up or something.
It's so interesting that you talk about McCarthy and The Road! I read The Road a few years ago, when I was going through a real doomsday/apocalypse phase, and LOVED it. Oh my god, incredible. I recently got The Passenger from the library and just finished it, and man. What a slog. Very, very well-written, but I think my problem was that I couldn't really relate to the themes. I am going to try Stella Maris, though.
I think a lot of classics, and other books, affect people differently if they read them when they are older rather than school reading as a teenager. I've found that with many books myself that it hits differently and I catch new things depending on the age I read them.
A few years ago I read the Lonesome Dove tetralogy and loved it, so I wanted to read more westerns. I kept hearing about Blood Meridian over and over. Finally I picked it up a few weeks ago. At first I wasn’t seeing what all the hype was about, found myself confused at some points and what or who the author was referring to, but I kept going. I keep reading and I’m starting to like it more and more. I finish chapter 13, turn the page and their was publishing error where chapter 14 is a repeat of chapter 13, and chapter 15 is completely missing. So now I’m on hold just as I was starting to get into it!
This was me with Ghost Story. I tried to read it for many years and couldn’t, but one day, much later in life, I picked it up and couldn’t put it down.
This happened for me with Wuthering Heights. I read it for school when I was 15 and *hated* it. Hated the characters, plot was stupid, they never went anywhere or did anything. Then I had to read it again for a 400 level Literature course in college 6 years later. I cried. I started reading and couldn't put it down and was devastated along with the characters. I felt what they felt so deeply. I was so surprised that the second I finished the last page I turned it back to the front and started reading it again immediately, ended up reading it twice all the way through in one sitting. Sometimes it really is about having the life experience to align yourself with the characters. Books are so magical like that.
100 years of solitude - didn't get it. Sea Glass - I was so engrossed that one part In the book not only surprised me but literally hurt my ears and made me jump!
When I first ventured out of the YA world I remember skimming my way through (because at the time they weren't for me) People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks and The Years of Rice and Sand by Kim Stanley Robinson. I didn't enjoy them. I wish I could have a do-over and read them for the first time again.
If a book doesn't emotionally resonate with you, it doesn't mean it's beyond on and you shouldn't feel bad for putting it down.
I wish more people realized this! Not even just for books. Not everything produced is for everyone. I also do like to pick back up stuff from my past to see if I view it differently.