Inspired by the book snob thread on the other side of the coin what negative reactions or just lack of understanding have people who are regular book readers come across?
I tend to have a book close to hand and have a quick read during any downtime, the advantage is that I have the reputation for being a lot more intelligent than I actually am, the disadvantage is that some people seem to think you’re showing off by doing so. One colleague once asked me what I was reading and when I showed her the book (Goshawk Squadron by Derek Robinson, a fictional book about British WW1 fighter pilots) she sort of snorted and commented, “It’s no wonder you’re so weird” before walking off…if she thought that was a strange book to be reading I’m not sure how she’d react to the really off-the-wall stuff. I was surprised because she was a generally pleasant person otherwise.
Having a book at hand is also a good means of starting a conversation, even if someone isn’t a book reader themselves the topic may interest them or just provide a hook to hinge a conversation on.
Of course the nature of the material you read makes a difference but my reading habits tend to be pretty conventional for a ruggedly handsome Irishman with piercing blue eyes and manly jawline like myself, namely military history, science fiction etc but I’ll read pretty much anything if it crosses my path. (The Female Man by Joanna Russ was probably the most recent book out of my comfort zone that I’ve read)
As for non-book-readers, well I think they’re missing out but each to their own, there are plenty of aspects of life which I don’t find interesting but others do (most sport for one).
That post was a totally incoherent mess, hopefully my meaning is at least sort of clear.
They did when I was a kid. I took so much shit because I always had a book with me, including “good-natured” teasing about it from most of the adults in my life. It’s the reason that to this day I bristle whenever anyone asks me about a book I happen to be reading. When I was a kid, that question invariably led to, “You’re so weird” or some variation thereof.
As an adult, though, nobody ever really says anything. Now that half the population (OK, not quite, but still) is carrying around a Kindle or other e-reader, it’s not nearly as weird to always have a book with me. I might still get the occasional lifted eyebrow when someone realizes that I’m reading hard sci-fi or a nonfiction science book or something else not currently on the NY Times bestseller list or YA fiction (not that there’s anything wrong with bestsellers or YA books; I’ve read my share of those too) but that’s about it.
No, or if they do/did I never noticed because I would never care.
I was the kid who couldn’t take a shower without reading every shampoo bottle. I read walking to school. I stayed up all night (my mom was very accommodating, she didn’t care if we went to sleep so long as we were in our rooms and quiet by a certain time). I honestly think reading is the reason I have essentially zero interest in music.
Still, I don’t go to a dinner party at a friends house without a book in my jacket in case everybody dies and I have to spend a quiet bit waiting for the police to arrive.
So, lots of opportunity but honestly don’t recall anybody ever making an issue of it.
What I will often get is, when they learn what I’m reading, some version of “ok, but what do you read for fun.” That’s annoying.
Not since I was in high school. Variation on the theme: I was also a tabletop RPGer. It blew people’s minds that I would spend my spare time doing something that so very intimately involved so many books.
Not anymore, but age and a reputation for eccentricity hath privileges. My recent public reading has been almost entirely history, biography, or science fiction. No one raises an eyebrow at a fiftyish man reading a book about Teddy Roosevelt.
Same here. Mom used to kick me out of the house to go play in the yard… and I’d bring a book. All my reading didn’t exactly make me popular, but I got over it.
The eyebrow-lift response you describe is part of why I started that “snob” thread. I get a lot of “you’re reading that for fun??” about my non-fiction choices, and a lot of people incredulous that I’m reading anything other than the latest bestselling fad.
When I was young, my Old World grandmother who raised me told me that I was going to go crazy because I read too much but I have yet to go up a grassy knoll or into a crowded movie theater to shoot the place up. Yet.
Oh hell yes. Especially my in-laws. My husband and daughter and I were over at their house, some years ago, and everyone was entranced by the crap that was on TV. I dug one of the books out of my purse and started reading. MIL and FIL asked if I was just too good to watch TV. I said no, I just wasn’t interested in most TV, and especially not whatever was currently on (a sitcom of some sort, with the typical idiot plot).
As a kid, I was considered weird because I liked reading so much that I’d do it in odd little snatches of time. I was considered ESPECIALLY weird because I read science fiction. Girls weren’t supposed to like SF.
Before I got my nook, I always carried at least two and usually more paperbacks in my purse. Now I carry my nook and at least one paperback, because the nook might die on me. I will never understand people who go to a doctor’s appointment and paw through the magazines and then complain that there’s nothing interesting to read. Well, I paw through the magazines too, in case the doc has something interesting that I don’t subscribe to, but I’ve also got my own reading material.
I’m very possessive of my nook. I thought that I’d hate it when my daughter gave it to me, but I’ve come to love it dearly. I still love dead tree books, but my nook has given me new ways to enjoy books. Alas, it’s entirely too easy to buy ebooks.
For a while when I was young and attractive-ish. Got some grief from guys who couldn’t imagine I would rather read the book I brought to the diner with me than be chatted up.
At 50, this is not longer a problem. Now I think I get pitying looks from people who think I must be a terribly lonely old thing. Takes away the pleasure of taking a book out to coffee when my husband is out of town. Now I stay at home with the cats mostly. Damn all this Iowa friendliness.
Not since I finished school, caught a lot of crap in a school where rugby and cricket were damn near religions. I was a real book-worm when I was a kid which lasted up until a few years ago when my reading dropped off a bit.
I’ve only gotten comments if I’m reading in an odd place. Like reading while I’m walking or reading while I’m waiting in line for a roller coaster. I doubt I’d get any comments if I were texting while walking or texting while waiting in line for a roller coaster, though!
