Betsy Bird’s 100 Best MG novels countdown has been mentioned here a couple of times. #1 revealed today.
While reading through the comments I noticed one person said the #1 book was one she rereads, adding, “I rarely reread any book.” Oddly, this was the third time in about as many days that I’ve run across such a comment about rereading.
I reread a lot. A LOT. This is a carryover no doubt from my youth when I spent more time rereading than reading new books. As a result, I was poorly read by the time I went to college. (Cathleen Schine has a lovely essay on her very similar youthful reading habits in the NY Times.)
Rereading is my best medicine for getting out of the writing doldrums. I may not finish an entire book, but I’ll reread enough to absorb the writing and once again fill up my head with language I love and admire. And sometimes I do finish the book and go on to another favorite by that author, immersing myself in his or her voice.
Story hardly matters when I reread. A return visit is all about “the how” of it. Marveling at an opening and the immediacy of mood, admiring the deft passing of time, savoring a word.
Of course I read new (to me) books, lots of them. I’m always thrilled to find a new book and writer I love; even so, it’s rereading that fuels the writing fire.
Currently Rereading: The Truth of the Matter, by Robb Forman Dew. Anyone else rereading something?
MQ
I always get so much out of rereading and yet I rarely do it. I was so glad the Hamline reading list made me go back to my childhood favorites, but honestly it had been so long it was like reading for the first time.
ReplyDeleteI do think one could read Charlotte's Web on an endless repeat. Others that would go on my list are Middlemarch, To the Lighthouse, and Annie Dillard's An American Childhood.
I rarely do either, so thanks for the nudge, Marsha. But I picked up Eve Bunting's WW II English boarding school novel published in 1995 - Spying on Miss Muller at the library over the weekend. Everything about it is grand, including the title. I loved it back then and now am appreciating the strong first person voice and the clever plotting. For years I have also admired the breadth and depth of Eve's writing career.
ReplyDeleteI was a chronic rereader in my youth--the binding on my copy of Witch of Blackbird Pond disintegrated from overuse--but now, not so much. When I reread adult books, they're funny ones--Nicholson Baker novels, Anne Lamott or David Sedaris essay collections. And I reread poems all the time.
ReplyDeleteNever thought much about it before, but I guess I reread for comfort, a healthy (and less messy) alternative to taking to my bed with a box of brownie mix and a spoon.
I have reread The Chocolate War and Go Ask Alice so many times I want to barf. I used to teach them--they were always the two that remained on the list semester after semester (for about nine years). Though I do still love The Chocolate War, and got a deeper appreciation each time I read it. But I think I may be done with those two for a while.
ReplyDeleteI had to reread them as opposed to skimming or reviewing my notes, because I have such a lame memory. In fact I'm sure I reread things all the time but just can't remember that I read it before. I'm like this with movies, too, but surprisingly not with my students' packets!
As a teen, I kept a list of how many times I reread each book, maybe to see which one was the "winner." It was an odd compulsion, but I still love to reread old friends.
ReplyDeleteI love to reread books that have become old friends, like To Kill a Mockingbird. But I've been rereading books for craft lately. I'm rereading Huck Finn to see how a master writes in first person without using the word 'I' constantly and without all that naval gazing.
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