3 ms·

Side question: Do people read dense technical books for fun?

• fokinsean 7y ago
  I have a hard time making it through one not for fun.
• zarkov99 7y ago
  For me a fun book has to be clearly written and present new (for me) ideas in a somewhat aesthetic way. Density I suppose is secondary. SICP is one of the best examples of the right balance, also Elements of Computing Systems.
• jolmg 7y ago
  The dense, technical books I've read, I've done so because I wanted a deep understanding of whatever the book's about. I want that understanding because I believe it will somehow lead to good things, like being able to accomplish certain goals, or build stuff that will benefit me. I guess I may get something of a thrill when understanding certain things, and when later I'm able to build or do things I couldn't before. I guess that's fun. However, while I read for fun, I don't find reading fun. Even for story books, I read because the content is fun, not because visually parsing ink on paper is fun.
• commandlinefan 7y ago
  Hm - maybe “fun” isn’t the right word, but I do find it mostly relaxing and pleasant to work through one as long as I’m not under any time pressure. I enjoyed TAOCP, for example, but I’ve definitely tried to read other books that I ended up giving up on, too.