The tyranny of the “reading list”

I’m constantly amazed by my wife (Heidi), who doesn’t appear to have any reading list at all. If she finds something interesting at the library or a friend recommends a book to her, she’s quick to pick it up and begin reading. On rare occasions, she even acts on my recommendations, the most recent being Frank Schaeffer’s Why I’m An Atheist Who Believes in God (which she enjoyed) and John Irving’s A Widow for One Year (which scandalized her).

I, on the other hand, am forever weighed down by all of the books I should read (and the movies I should watch). Even though I purged my personal library of over 100 books when we moved last summer (many of which I had already read, some of which I had been holding onto, unread, for over two decades), hundreds more unread books continue to lurk on my shelves, preying on my mind. Despite my purge, their numbers continue to grow, due in no small part to the re-use store at our local waste transfer station, where I can often pick up excellent books for free.

The “should” part of my reading list includes not only individual books, which is bad enough, but individual authors. When I was in my twenties, for example, it wasn’t good enough for me to simply read On the Road by Jack Kerouac. I felt compelled to read several of his other works as well as works by his Beat contemporaries and analysis of the same.

More recently, it wasn’t enough to read one or two books by Rene Girard, I feel the need to read everything he has written (in reverse order) so that I can trace the development of his thought over time. I also feel compelled to read the works that influenced him. Then, of course, I need to read critical reaction to his theories and see how his numerous disciples have applied mimetic theory to everything from economics to movies.

Speaking of movies, I take the same approach to film. It’s not enough for me to enjoy one or two of Werner Herzog or Woody Allen’s films, for example. I need to watch all of them and then immerse myself in commentary and criticism as well as biographical details of the filmmakers so that I have a better understanding of their films in the context of their personal lives as well as the culture at large.

Apart from a form of ingrained myopic mania–which, for better or worse, I have observed in some of my children–my compulsion to read both deep and wide is due largely because I never came close to fulfilling my academic aspirations. If you read the profile in my high school yearbook, you’ll note that one of my goals was to attain a PhD. in something. At the time, I was thinking about philosophy or political science. However,  the closest I got was a year into my Masters degree (in which I focused on epistemology).

Seeing as many of my friends are academics and intellectuals, I am always acutely aware of my lack. The same goes for film. Even though I have spent the better part of the last decade as a screenwriter and filmmaker, I never went to film school, so I feel like I’m constantly in catch-up mode. Having missed the opportunity to pursue my education through formal channels, I feel constant pressure to take things into my own hands. So you could think of my life as one long guided study. Unlike my wife, I rarely read for pleasure alone. My reading is nearly always driven by some sort of “higher” purpose.

It doesn’t take a PhD in psychology to discern that I probably suffer from some sort of deep-seated inferiority complex. I’ll be the first to admit that’s a huge part of what drives me. But on a more positive level, I am also driven by an insatiable need to know. Not because I feel like having knowledge will confer power or alleviate my fears, I just derive deep, deep pleasure from learning. In fact, one of the most “famous” pictures of my childhood is me asleep on the couch, probably at age 7 or 8, with a volume from our science encyclopedia set open on my lap.

I also clearly remember one of the few times I caught heck from my teacher in grade two. It was for constantly turning around and telling my friend what I was learning from Charlie Brown’s Super Book of Questions and Answers About All Kinds of Animals (which I still have). I was also one of those nerds who bought the Star Wars Question and Answer Book About Space (which I wish I still had) and read it over and over and over again. As far back as I can remember, this compulsion been one of the defining characteristics of my life.

In light of this, what am I reading right now? As if often the case, I currently have several books on the go.

1. Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond

2. Welcome to the Monkey House by Kurt Vonnegut

3. The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

I’m reading the first book, because I was so taken by Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel, and I’m eager to see how he continues his thinking in this area. And if I’m completely honest, I have to say I’m sorely tempted to read Questioning Collapse, a book-length rebuttal to Diamond’s book, and then Diamond’s critique of Questioning Collapse in the journal Nature.

The second book is only my second Vonnegut title (the first being Slaughterhouse-Five). I’m reading it partly because I feel guilty for not reading more Vonnegut, who is one of those contemporary writers with whom I feel all educated people should be conversant; partly because it was one of my most recent finds at the re-use store; but mostly because I enjoy his work. This is also a collection of the short stories he wrote in order to fund the writing of his novels. So I find that intriguing. If I read for pure pleasure at all, this is as close as it comes.

The third book is another re-use store find. I’m reading it though because Crime and Punishment is one of my favorite novels, and I’ve been meaning to return to Dostoyevsky for years (all the while feeling guilting for having never read The Brothers Karamazov).

Of course, these books don’t include the two dozen or so news articles I consume each day, covering everything from politics to business to entertainment. There’s just so much to know, and so little time to absorb and process it all. I’m a Renaissance man in a wired world, and it’s starting to drive me a little crazy.

I thought about calling this post “How to overthrow the tyranny of the reading list,” but I know enough from my reading that revolutions tend to devour their children (Jacques Mallet du Pan). Besides, I have no idea how to overcome it, and at the moment, I’m not even sure I want to. Like any addict, I know it’s probably killing me, but I still haven’t hit rock bottom, so stay away from my stash, thank you very much.

Where does this leave me? With multiple books on the go and a never-ending list of follow-up titles–and a sense of urgency that even as I am enjoying one book, I should probably finish it soon so I can go on to the next. It’s a terrible way to live, I admit. Perhaps it would be better to abandon the reading list altogether and read one book over and over again for the rest of my life in the hope that I might finally come to truly understand it. It’s an intriguing possibility, and I admire people who are able to become so laser-focused. Unfortunately, that would require a complete overhaul of my prime directive, which seems (hell)bent on assimilating huge amounts of data and distilling it own into it’s basic underlying principles. I’m like Neo, sequestered alone in my room, night after night, driven by a compulsion I can’t understand, much less articulate. I have to know what the Matrix is. 

I just hope I don’t have to wait too much longer for Morpheus and his crew to come along and show me.