You Don't Have to Read Hard Books (unless ...) 

I'm reading Will Durant's 'The Story of Philosophy' right now and I really like his writing so it was nice to hear about his history of civilization set. Im going to have to hunt those down now.. I always end up with a side quest after one of your videos haha Thanks, Steve!

Here's the thing... I took up Ulysses after seeing all the lists of "the hardest books" people saying it was basically unreadable nonsense or it was meant for literary scholars. I just hate that idea: "this is not for you." Glad I didn't listen. That book made me fall in love with reading all over again after like a decade of barely reading anything for pleasure.

Can you make a video talking about “deep reading”? There seems to be a lot of made up pressure in making sure you’re “understanding” the book rather than sometimes just enjoying the read on a first go. As someone who struggles to juggle this, would love to hear your thoughts! Love your content!

Im too much a dabbler to be considered well-read in any subject, which is unfortunate. I only know enough to get myself into trouble.

Thank you so much for the mention, Steve! I agree with you completely about my selection of The Whisperers! I think I got distracted by trying not to step on That Ready Guy's toes-he had picked Gulag Archipelago and The House of Government, both books I absolutely wanted to pick-and I got the idea of picking a similar book that focuses on the direct words of people suffering during the Soviet Union. Funny how sometimes we can get fixed arbitrarily on a theme like that.

The Color Purple was written by Alice Walker and not Toni Morrison (also I would argue everyone should read The Color purple and Toni Morrison)

I have to read very technical papers for my job but I also read a lot of stuff that most people would consider hard simply because I find the subject interesting such as math and science then turn around and pull an old Hardy Boys book I got when I was 6 and reread it because I want to and I don't care that it's formulaic and looked down on. I like revisting books I enjoyed as a kid and will go back to Virginia Woolf tomorrow because I read what I want when I want

Something tells me that you and I could have quite the delightful exchange on this topic whether via email or Voxer. Not that we'd disagree much - I am getting CLOSER to having a strong background in Medieval Literature, and I still need to reach the end of the 12-volume Histories of Middle-earth before I can even entertain the idea on being well-read in Tolkien...

I feel reasonably conversant in contemporary moral philosophy from Bernard Williams to Peter Singer and even Jurgen Habermas. I tried to read Parfit’s Reasons And Persons more than once and failed. There is something almost inhuman in how he thinks. And you’re right, his prose is unreadable. If I have to read On What Matters to say I’m conversant in the field, I take my first claim back.

The Color Purple is Walker. I think you meant to say Beloved

I look to read over my head as part of my dementia preventia program. It's great when it means reading what the writer read. It's thrilling even when I have to gloss over text occasionally. Right now Proust's Sodom and Gomorrah is killing me a little, can't lie. Two pages a day.

Great video Steve! I hope on the next Steve stream we get in depth analysis of The Atlantic's "Great American Novels" list. You'll DEFINITELY have some opinions.

I keep Michael Schmidt's book on "The Novel" on my desk. This is the first time in my entire life I have ever heard anyone else mention it until this video. I remember picking it up the year it came out possibly a decade ago. I have also read "A Secular Age" by Charles Taylor. I think it is the book I have spent the longest time reading. I am reasonably certain I spent almost two months with it. I am grateful I did, though. It covers a lot of very interesting ground. I think Gould's best book is "Wonderful Life," followed by "Time's Arrow, Time's Cycle." I did not however find "The structure of Evolutionary Theory" to be repetitive. I originally read it because of the historical coverage of theory; but, as you said, Gould's writing can be very likeable, and as I progressed to his own theories in the subsequent sections, I found them very engaging and thought-provoking. I'm not a biologist so I don't know that staking an opinion on the matter would be substantive, but I did enjoy every second of the book. Also, "The Modern Mind" is not at all difficult, but it is the book which sparked so much subsequent reading in my life. I wrote an essay about it recently, reminiscing about reading it ten years ago. While writing the essay, it struck me that I have probably read more than a hundred books specifically because I became interested in them while reading "The Modern Mind." While revisiting it for the essay, and revisiting my juvenile notes I had taken when I first read it, I do now recognize it has some issues - blindspots regarding important subjects, insubstantial coverage of others - and an overall weak argument that I happened to be on the side of at the time. But it is a book that has mattered a lot to me. "You've got to read Eudora Welty." This is true.

Interesting subject. I agree with you on reading what you enjoy. That's what I've done since I got out of school. I just read Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and a little bit of Horror. I have read a few Military fiction, along with some classics. But I always go back to my favorites. The older I get, the more fussy I am with what I read. These day I tend to stick to rereading the basics. Conan, Lord Of The Rings, and Dune. I'll branch out every now and then and try something newer, like The Three Body Problem and Gardens Of The Moon. But I haven't continued with either series. Right now, I've reread Conan, The Hobbit & LOTR so many times that I've been slowly reading the authors other work. Like you said, it's not all good. A lot of it can be boring or just bad. But it's a good way to get into and connect it to my favorite books. With Howard, I have his Westerns, Boxing Stories, Horror, Historical, and Letters with H.P. Lovecraft. I also read Lovecraft. I'm not even a big fan of his. But I do like the Howard connection. There is a bit of shared world building with the two. With Tolkien, I'm working my way through the Histories Of Middle Earth, along with his other work. With Frank Herbert, I just read Direct Descent. After that, I realized that I just care about his 6 Dune books. Besides rereading those, I'm reading the Dune Encyclopedia. Even though he didn't write it, I'm still finding it a fun read. But really, to be well read, don't waste your time with any of the books Steve mentioned. Just read all the Ace Conan books along with all the Tor pastiche books in the chronological order of the Official Conan Chronology. Then you can say with 100% certainty, that you are a well read individual.

Hi Steve and Frieda, I love what I've read of the Durant's writing so far. I've read Heroes of History and Our Oriental Heritage and bits and pieces of some of the others. I really need to get back to reading the series soon. I've been meaning to ask, do you have any recommendations for once I finish the series? I would love to continue on with more modern history that would pick up where the Age of Napoleon leaves off.

I do like the unless - makes sense to me if you want to be "literate" in that old fashioned sense. I do like you make that distinction between reading these books and not 'liking' them. I would say this applies to genre fiction as well - you can't say you are well-read in a genre if you only read book released in 24 months (IMO)

As a non-western person, I agree with most of the books you said, shakespear books, Bible, city of god, moby dick and some other books are on my list of read-before-death. Especially the first two which without knowing them I cannot understand many of western things, from movies to books.

I won’t stop until I can call my hair Babel hahahaha

I disagree with characterizing the desire to master a subject as pleasure. I certainly derive pleasure from my study of late tsarist Russia, even if I have to read some boring books to do so. However, I don’t think I do it because it brings me pleasure. I have a desire for knowledge and understanding that is pleasurable because it is good. I don’t just want the feeling of knowing how the Tsar fell. I want the knowledge.

I revisit this topic a lot since I've been reading all the books on the Boxall's 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die list for a few years now. That title really invites one to question what people really NEED to read before they die. The actual books on the lists are often problematic, and as a list they tend to feel like a long assigned reading list from mostly-male academics in Britain, which is exactly what the list is. But even if a list like this was made by a more inclusive group of readers, it can't possibly take into account the specific contexts of readers' lives, and what they are hoping to accomplish by reading. I am gradually making my own 1001 books list, of course (quite a few of us who have been reading this list have been making our own lists, weeding out the ones we disliked and adding in books the Boxall lists missed) but I'd be surprised if most people I know would like my list any better than any other big book list.

I think there's little to no chance that Toni Morrison will be remembered for The Color Purple. 😐

This discussion seems based around fiction. What about nonfiction? I assume the same asterisks apply, but no one I've seen seems to make lists of nonfiction you "must" read. I've got an American history project where I've tried to identify which history books I must read to have a layperson's understanding of US history. I've had no one to guide me. So far I think I've done a decent job.

I read the Anatomy of Melancholia decades before the "dude-bros" found it. I found it in an Exeter, Devon s/h bookshop. I'd come across in the bibliographies of other books. My grandad had given me half a crown, 25p now for cleaning his old car. I blew it on this book. At 16 it was a puzzle, but I reread it again about 5 years ago and got lots more out of it.

I love this video- I agree with everything you said!

In the category of "hard books" I would like to consider some plays - Raisin in the Sun, Riders to the Sea, The Tempest, maybe Waiting For Godot (Becket) and No Exit (Sartre) and Faust/Faustus (Goethe/Marlowe). Regardless, since these are plays , reading is valuable, but the play has to be seen. Books are read, then discussed and re-read and maybe read one more time to find what the author is trying to say, but they are singular experiences - one person reads one book. Plays are different - they have to be experienced by several people at the same time. They are meant to be watched, then discussed and then watched again by a group of people. What do you thin?

You nailed it on the head in so many ways. I wish the internet community was far less critical. I gave up my channel. I am at work (as in, in the building) between 10 to 14 hours a day. After that, I go home where I still need to prep lessons, mark assessments, set exams, plan the schedules for the people in my department, arrange an academic recovery programme, plan and implement the remedial programme.... the list goes on. I basically work 16 hours a day - at the least. There are many days where I work 20 hours a day. There are times when I can read intellectually fulfilling novels, and there are times where Alex Rider feels like it is mentally taxing. My reading must have nothing to do with other people's ideas, judgements or perspectives. This month I marked an 80cm pile of exams and tasks (excluding national requirements of remarking) - I have to be accurate, the future of many kids depends on it. The fact that I read anything beyond kids' tests is amazing. I gave up on RU-vid because the subscribers I had were highbrow readers and I did not want to disappoint. I cannot be a highbrow reader every week, or even most weeks. I actually have to get work - for work - done. I am brain dead, numb, stressed and exhausted. I do not have the energy to spare. Having said that though, it is so difficult for someone who is rather well read, to find something mentally stimulating while not being mentally taxing. I just want something intelligent to read that is 1)not depressing, 2)unnecessarily complicated and 3)nonsense labelled as art... A pleasant plotline would not go amiss either as I need some upliftment in my day-to0day life. If you could help in recommendations, I would really appreciate it.

It’s interesting to hear you speak about McCarthy here as listening to you speak my mind was moving to his work with regards the matter of judgment and value. It’s strange to my mind that people will criticise adults for say reading harry potter ( as Will self recently has) and yet a book as creatively impoverished as the road will get a Pulitzer. That being said I don’t think it will necessarily be the case that McCarthy will be forgotten or that it is desirable that he should be having read numerous of his works recently I think it is fair to say that he is overrated for poor works like the road and that blood meridian is just not a work that holds up under scrutiny but I also think that there is value in his creativity and that this is to be found in Stella Maris and the passenger ( a book not without problems). An example of this is in his worst work the road where his treatment of women is seen by some as misogynistic or unrealistic I think he offers a valuable depiction of an individual who is reacting to their situation in a way that is out of keeping with common perceptions of motherhood and offers the reader a chance to reflect upon the human psychology as something that can become unreachable and hostile. The dialogue is intriguing as a representation of an individual who is determined to die to the extent that they are able to utilise their knowledge of someone else in order to prevent their being talked back into survival. No country for old men also stands as a genuine good read.

Yes, 40 million Frenchmen will say you are not knowledgeable about modern French literature if you have not read In Search of Lost Time. I don't think the 5 million Irishmen will be so adamant about Ulysees. They may let you off with A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

Hey Steve, what Japanese authors would you recommend besides Haruki Murakami (I love that writer)?

I am a huge huge romance reader. I feel that reading should be pleasurable. Reading should be fun in my opinion. I have auto buy authors that I read. When I was in school the teachers would assign you books that you had to read that weren’t fun to read. I pick books that I myself want to read.

29:50 dude bros attack!

Informative. Thanks

Still waiting for someone to explain Foucault's Pendulum. And why would someone not want to read Cloud Atlas. Its a pleasure.

I thought you were exaggerating about the American universities but then I heard of the religious art professor who got fired for teaching art and showing a picture of the prophet. 😅

I've never heard of "indigenous science". I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not.

What you say here about Cormac McCarthy is fascinating to me. I've only read The Road and Blood Meridian, so I have no allegiance to his work, really.

You got the hookup for ebooks of Gould’s Evolutionary Theory? Looks like the kindle price is $55!!

I think I've gotten lost on what the definition of a dude bro is in the context of these discussions! Perhaps I need to make a deeper study of your videos.

Does wanting to read Charles Taylor qualify me as a dudebro? 🤔

Some pleasure reading, eg history, biographies,diaries and the more demanding books you read the more pleasure you will get. Steve's "squealer" books are often demanding, hence, I rest my case. I saw today that Trump says he can't pay the NY charges, hooray! His lies are beginning to bite his arse.

You're dead wrong about McCarthy...again. But I guess we'll just agree to disagree on that.

The master doth protest too much, methinks.

Personally, I am baffled by the remarks you so often make about McCarthy. Writing is an Artform, not a Science, therefore completely subjective. It's obvious that McCarthy is a successful writer, maybe not to your personal liking, but none the less. What am I missing.🤔