Can you read too much?

In My Humble Opinion
21

I’m the same way, and I get labelled as anti-social as well. Damn it, I’m HAPPY in my house. I got my computer (games and Internet), my books, and Netflix. What more could a girl want? It’s not that I don’t enjoy social gatherings - I typically do - but once a week is more than enough for me.

Mr. Athena, however, requires a bit more social interaction than I do, so I usually get out more than once a week. Most of the time it’s OK. Times like this week, with activities 3 nights in a row, make my head hurt.

On the flip side of this, I know from experience that it is possible for me to get too little social interaction. I lived alone for about a year, in essentially a long distance relationship. It was very easy for me not to plan any social commitments. I got weird. I eventually had to force myself to go out with friends at least once a week to balance out my life.

22

Exactly my point. Almost any book has at least a tidbit of information. I tuck these away like a squirrel hoards nuts.

A similar thing happened to me. A strange artifact was donated to the museum in which I work. No one could identify it. When I came in, I saw it on the desk and exclaimed, “Cool. A battery!”

Everyone stopped. “It’s a * what *?”

I explained that you were supposed to put wine or vinegar in the glass chamber. When you screwed the cap back on, the metal rod was suspended in the liquid, and an electro-chemical reaction between the two would cause a mild electrical current. “Doctors, well, quacks anyway, used to use these in treatment of arthritis.”

Everyone stared at me in awe, asking where I had learned this. I just replied that a very similar one was found in an archaeological dig in Iraq. I didn’t want to confess that I think I first saw it in a *Ripley’s Believe it or Not * book from my childhood.

I think part of people’s reactions to readers may come from the media. People who are readers in movies and television shows are usually portrayed as odd, lonely, socially maladjusted creatures whom the other characters try to lure into “getting a life.” Rarely, if ever, do you see a main character in a show reading for pleasure, unless they’re rapidly flipping through a magazine.

Readers are seriously undervalued in our society. As children, readers are harasssed and teased as being nerds. (A girl actually spit in my hair because I was reading a book in grade-school. Teachers used to urge me to put the book down at recess and go play.) As adults, people take pity on those who spend their time reading, as if it were a character flaw. They seem to think readers must be “rescued” from their “boring” lives.

Me, I try to rescue *them. * I buy books for friends and coax them to read them. For one friend who was a movie buff, I got her a biography of her favorite star. She actually read it, and enjoyed it. Another friend I gave a book of ghost stories. Later, she asked me where she could find more of them. I drove her to the bookstore, and treated her to a stack.

Heh, heh… slowly winning converts am I.

23

I used to get in trouble in school for reading too much. I’d get my work done and pick up whatever book I was into. My teachers thought I was neglecting my work to read.

I don’t think you can read too much, in fact, I think most people don’t read enough.

Yes, it’s a great escape, but it’s a healthy way to do so.

24

Are you me? :wink: I can remember preferring to read at recess, too. The other option was to play Kick Ball or Dodge Ball, organized by the teachers. Dodge Ball usually ended up being a game of Whip the Ball at The Head of Whoever Can’t Get the Ball. I hated it. I always took a book out with me, and sat on the steps leading down to the playground. The teachers thought there was something wrong with me, that I’d rather read than run around getting smacked with a hard ball. :rolleyes:

25

I think I read too much. But I think that because I know I do it sometimes to avoid doing things I should be doing (e.g., cleaning house).

I’ll also read instead of doing some things I want to do (practicing archery, cutting arrow shafts and making arrows), but are things that will take some time and will be a bit difficult (i.e., I’m lazy.)

Except for instances like that, reading is definitely a good thing.

26

At my grade school, the principle punishment for misbehavior was to be sent to the library during recess. For severe infractions, your recess privileges could be revoked entirely for a week or more.

My teachers never quite grasped why I so cheerfully accepted my punishments :wink: By the time I went on to junior high school, I think I had read every single volume in that library. It – literally – changed my life.

To address the OP: It is possible to do anything too much. It is, however, very, very difficult to read too much.

27

Yeah, I had someone try to pull that “reading=escapist=bad” crap on me. My reply was that books are the accumulated knowledge of our species and that not to read was to be less than fully human.

Lesson: Don’t get between Gobear and his books.

I wonder if people who think reading fiction is bad say the same thing about television or movies. Reading focuses the mind, improves the vocabulary, inculcates models of moral behavior, and develops creativity. The crucial difference is that even the most puerile Star Trek “novels” demand participation from the reader in ways that television and movies do not. Watching TV is passive, but reading is active.

28

:cool:
Lesson: Don’t get between BiblioCat and her books.

29

Just a note, that pretty much describes me to a “t”. q;}

30

You know, I think it’s amazing that, for my age group (20s), it’s socially acceptable to go to bars, drink until you can’t stand up, and then go home with someone you barely know. That’s “fun.” But reading, oooh, man, why would you want to do that?!

31

I know what you mean. My friends sometimes give me a hard time when I opt to stay home and relax and read rather than bar hop all night. A lot of people don’t seem to realize how enjoyable reading can be.

32

Mephisto and Lissa what I meant was if you do nothing but read 24/7, 365 days a year.

Ive had a few days too where I do nothing but read, usually if I have nothing else on and Ive got a book I want to read all day then I’ll do it. Last time I done it though was for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Im having a really difficult time of finding books that can hold my interest…

33

Disclaimer: I read three or four books a week, own hundreds of books, gave books away by the dozens before the last move, and don’t like TV much. I am married to a man who reads more than I do - although he does like TV.

Quibble: Michael Moorcock wrote a premise to a reissue of his greatest novels a couple of decades ago, which struck a sad chord in me. I attempted to forget what he said, but didn’t succeed. To summarize at long distance, when he was writing about (I had nearly said “being”) Eric, he was sad, lonely, introverted, and getting worse. Writing the fantasy was like living the fantasy. The more he wrote, the worse he got.

I have felt this pull towards the downward spiral during rough years of my life when I read a lot. I think there is a certain time in your life, or perhaps only in certain people’s lives, in which the satisfactions of fantasy can pull you away from the frustrations and rewards of reality. This would be, fantasy whether you only dream it, whether you write it, read it, or videogame it: you would think reading or writing it would be healthier, but Michael Moorcock said no, of himself. If you find yourself making that bargain with the devil, then perhaps you read too much.

Oddly enough, at this more social (about at Lissa’s happy level) and more rewarding time of my life, my taste for other people’s fantasy has nearly evaporated, and I find myself loving books about what is, and how it got that way. Evolution and history being the two current favorites. Odd.

34

I heard a quote very recently, ‘People who read a lot are often the stupidest’

I dont mean to offend, anyone who reads a lot and has a large enough brain will understand the worth in the quote.

the thoeretical vs the practical

35

I rarely read fiction myself. The majority of my books are history, and social behavior. To some, that’s almost *worse * than reading fiction.

At work one day, I was reading a book about the social history of table manners. My co-worker thought this was utterly bizarre. Why should anyone care why ettiquette exists? I tried to explain that I love to know the orgins of our customs and why we behave as we do, but she couldn’t understand.

Thankfully, my museum benefits from people’s disrespect for books. We often get donations of very rare books, letters, diaries and manuscripts because the heirs have no interest in them. I was absolutely floored when a man brought in his great-great grandfather’s Civil War record books (the original owner had been a doctor during the war, and afterward was in charge of determining whether injured veterans deserved a pension.)

It was fascinating reading. The books detailed the most horrific battle injuries, and what the doctor had done to try to heal them in wonderfully clear prose. There were descriptions of battles and human pathos, tales the soldiers had told him, and heart-rending stories of tradgedy.

After the war, the doctor’s reasons for granting pensions or rejecting the application showed clearly the moral snobbery of the day. One soldier who had lost his arm was rejected because he was known to “consort with Vulgar Women.” Inside the journal was a letter from a man pleading his case, saying he had “fallen into drink” but was trying to reform himself.

After only reading a few pages, I asked the donor how he could bear to part with the books. He simply shrugged, and said he had no use for them-- they were just “taking up space.”

36

sarcophilus, I think that’s my problem. Whenever I’m interested in learning something new, I read a lot about it. I can tell you LOTS of theortical stuff about lots of things. It’s the practical stuff I’m not so good at.

Frustrates me no end.

Oh yeah, and did I mention I can be lazy?:rolleyes:

37

Man! That sounds amazing. Any chance of someone putting it all together and publishing it?

38

Your friend is flat out wrong. Reading is good for you.

39

“The people who hate escapism the most are jailers.”
—J.R.R. Tolkien

And I must agree with gobear and Lissa…we’re not the people with the “problem.” After all, it will be the non-readers who Minerva shall CLEANSE from the EARTH with HOLY FIRE—

Er…um…I mean…Just remember what happened to Mr. Garrett in The Martian Chronicles. “Ignorance is fatal,” after all.

40

That would be nice. Perhaps it will be published, or at least parts of it used in other works. We have scholars researching our archives all of the time.

Unfortunately, my job doesn’t bring me in contact with the research teams often enough to know which of our items is being used. I occasionally later find citations occasionally in history books.