Books don't change; readers do

• I read Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy when in high school. I loved it for the adventure story.
• I read it again in college. I loved it for the historical echoes of WWII.
• I read it again as an adult (just before the movie version was released). I loved it for the author’s writing style.

One story; three different readers. As the new LOTR  “prequel” streams, I may just need to read the books again. The words will be the same; the reader, I am sure, will not be.

I am a book rereader.* In the past few months I’ve reread Hassler’s Staggerford, Simmons The Fall of Hyperion, Berendt’s Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, Child’s Personal, Connelly’s NIne Dragons, Huxley’s Brave New World, and Smith’s River God. And I am happy that I did.

I am fairly eclectic about the books I reread. What triggers my searching for them varies. The most fascinating rereads are those that I first read in high school such as Brave New World. Huxley’s classic may as well have been a completely new book since I remembered almost nothing about it.

What does rereading tell us about ourselves? Sometimes that our tastes have changed. Sometimes that we have become more culturally aware. And sometimes that we really are the same reader we were when much younger. Our experiences change us, and as we change, so does our relationship with what we read.

As an older reader, I increasingly need some worthwhile content in order to keep my interest as opposed to the simple plots loaded with action, sex, and violence that I craved as a younger reader. (Not that I turn my nose up at those elements now.) I perhaps have more patience and a broader range of topics and styles that keep my attention.

I believe it was Nancy Pearl (probably the closest thing to a celebrity librarian we have) who advised reading the first 50 pages of a book before deciding whether to continue or stop. Unless one was over 50 years old. If the reader was over 50, they should subtract their age from 100 and stop there to evaluate. My poor authors only get 30 pages to capture me.

* Old joke: advantages of dementia include that you are always making new friends and can hide your own Easter eggs. I’d add that you can always find new books to read as well.