4 ms·

I'm rather 'well read.' I don't say this boastfully as I feel a lot of it was a waste of time (although I also found a lot of philosphy/literature etc. very i

by jhales 14y ago

I'm rather 'well read.' I don't say this boastfully as I feel a lot of it was a waste of time (although I also found a lot of philosphy/literature etc. very insightful).

mindcrime 14y ago
I don't say this boastfully as I feel a lot of it was a waste of time I try to read a few "classics" now and then, and I definitely read more than just sci-fi. I like history, philosophy, biographies, etc., as well. But you touch on something we all have to struggle with: Time. There are only so many hours in the day to read, and every time I sit down to read, I have to make a decision on whether or not what I'm thinking about reading is a good use of my time. So... I'm going to get a certain amount of raw "escapism", pop-fiction stuff, that I need just to stay sane. That's a given. Now, how much time do I have left to read Homer, or obscure French and Russian "literature"? And to what end? Just to impress hipster douche-bags and self-appointed "intellectuals"? Or because reading that stuff is actually going to add value to my life? Is reading Madame Bovary or Anna Karenina going to do more for me than reading Teach Yourself Haskell in 21 Days or Asimov's "Foundation Trilogy" books, or whatever? The last few books I've read (other than technical books) include Run by Dean Karnazes, Born to Run by McDougal, The Belgian Hammer by Lee, Eat & Run by Scott Jurek, Racing Through the Dark by David Millar, Slaying the Badger by Moore, Running on Empty by Marshall Ulrich and The Secret Race by Tyler Hamilton. Would I be better off if I'd spent that time reading "literature" instead? I don't know, but I'm sceptical. OTOH, I have a whole pile of stuff lying here by Nietzsche, Kieerkegard, Hume, Foucalt, etc., that I'm planning to work through. But I'm reading it just because I find it interesting, not because I see it as having any more inherent value than "low brow" literature.
- jhales 14y ago
  I can't disagree with anything you said. We seem too have similar tastes as well. lol
- corporalagumbo 14y ago
  Anna Karenina is a really beautiful story. I read it a long time ago and it is, at the very least, a great achievement, so sweeping, so intricately detailed, so many rich characters, so much insight into human hopes and struggles. I don't know much about its context but I imagine if you read up on Tolstoy's life and Russian social conditions at the time it would make reading the book enormously stimulating - a panoramic story covering the intersection of a flowering cosmopolitan aristocratic society and a more ancient world of feudal landlords, at a turning point in history shortly before that world vanished forever. Mostly I would read Tolstoy for the same reason I would read Nietzsche - to break through our regrettable tendency to take the past and its people for granted. It's one thing to read about the ideas Nietzsche developed on a Wikipedia article, it's wholly another to read him in his own words and suddenly find yourself thrust into contact with a whole mind, a living, breathing bundle of thoughts and anxieties and dream, a human being palpably aching to find meaning, caught in the middle of one of the greatest social upheavals of human history. To get a sense, just for a moment, of the sheer enormity of the fact that whole generations of people lived and died without knowing anything of the world we lived in. 19th century literature is special. There is so much heat, passion, confusion, pain and soul-searching in it - it feels so close, yet so far, from the world we live in. For me at least it is humbling and amazing that people like Tolstoy laboured on and left behind such vivid traces of their souls for us to discover and enrich ourselves with. Edit: I suppose this is a long-winded way of saying that the value of literature is that it helps you develop reverence and respect for the enormous reality and weight of history. Arrogance and shocking stupidity are the natural consequences of not realising your tiny place in history. The best literature breeds deep humility.
  - mindcrime 14y ago
    Sure, I don't dispute any of that. And, in fact, I mentioned Anna Karenina partly because I bought a copy a few months ago because it is on my list of books to read. But I do question whether or not it has any particular value which exceeds any of the innumerable other works I could read with that time instead. Of course that might lead you ask "then why are you planning to read it"? To which I can only say "because it sounds interesting and exactly because I haven't read much Russian literature and I want to broaden my horizons a bit". But I'm not reading it because I want to be able to impress some hipster pseudo-intellectuals, or because it's something you're "supposed" to read. I just want to see what it's all about. Same with Crime and Punishment, which I started recently (but got distracted from and set aside temporarily). Mostly I would read Tolstoy for the same reason I would read Nietzsche - to break through our regrettable tendency to take the past and its people for granted. I agree with that, but I find that fiction from (and set in) Victorian era England has been my primary outlet for thinking about and appreciating the past in that regard. That's certainly not to discredit the Russian stuff you speak of, just saying that reading Tolstoy or Dostoevsky or whatever, isn't the only way to tap into that historical perspective. It's one thing to read about the ideas Nietzsche developed on a Wikipedia article, it's wholly another to read him in his own words and suddenly find yourself thrust into contact with a whole mind, a living, breathing bundle of thoughts and anxieties and dream, a human being palpably aching to find meaning, caught in the middle of one of the greatest social upheavals of human history. Indeed. I greatly enjoyed reading Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra and have quite a few of his other works on my list.
allenwlee 14y ago
do you mean you just stopped reading for pleasure at some point in your life? i can't imagine myself doing that.
- jhales 14y ago
  I still do, but I also get a lot of pleasure reading about what Taleb might call 'autistic things.'
  - allenwlee 14y ago
    haha. me too.

by jhales 14y ago

I'm rather 'well read.' I don't say this boastfully as I feel a lot of it was a waste of time (although I also found a lot of philosphy/literature etc. very insightful).

mindcrime 14y ago

I don't say this boastfully as I feel a lot of it was a waste of time I try to read a few "classics" now and then, and I definitely read more than just sci-fi. I like history, philosophy, biographies, etc., as well. But you touch on something we all have to struggle with: Time. There are only so many hours in the day to read, and every time I sit down to read, I have to make a decision on whether or not what I'm thinking about reading is a good use of my time. So... I'm going to get a certain amount of raw "escapism", pop-fiction stuff, that I need just to stay sane. That's a given. Now, how much time do I have left to read Homer, or obscure French and Russian "literature"? And to what end? Just to impress hipster douche-bags and self-appointed "intellectuals"? Or because reading that stuff is actually going to add value to my life? Is reading Madame Bovary or Anna Karenina going to do more for me than reading Teach Yourself Haskell in 21 Days or Asimov's "Foundation Trilogy" books, or whatever? The last few books I've read (other than technical books) include Run by Dean Karnazes, Born to Run by McDougal, The Belgian Hammer by Lee, Eat & Run by Scott Jurek, Racing Through the Dark by David Millar, Slaying the Badger by Moore, Running on Empty by Marshall Ulrich and The Secret Race by Tyler Hamilton. Would I be better off if I'd spent that time reading "literature" instead? I don't know, but I'm sceptical. OTOH, I have a whole pile of stuff lying here by Nietzsche, Kieerkegard, Hume, Foucalt, etc., that I'm planning to work through. But I'm reading it just because I find it interesting, not because I see it as having any more inherent value than "low brow" literature.

jhales 14y ago
I can't disagree with anything you said. We seem too have similar tastes as well. lol
corporalagumbo 14y ago
Anna Karenina is a really beautiful story. I read it a long time ago and it is, at the very least, a great achievement, so sweeping, so intricately detailed, so many rich characters, so much insight into human hopes and struggles. I don't know much about its context but I imagine if you read up on Tolstoy's life and Russian social conditions at the time it would make reading the book enormously stimulating - a panoramic story covering the intersection of a flowering cosmopolitan aristocratic society and a more ancient world of feudal landlords, at a turning point in history shortly before that world vanished forever. Mostly I would read Tolstoy for the same reason I would read Nietzsche - to break through our regrettable tendency to take the past and its people for granted. It's one thing to read about the ideas Nietzsche developed on a Wikipedia article, it's wholly another to read him in his own words and suddenly find yourself thrust into contact with a whole mind, a living, breathing bundle of thoughts and anxieties and dream, a human being palpably aching to find meaning, caught in the middle of one of the greatest social upheavals of human history. To get a sense, just for a moment, of the sheer enormity of the fact that whole generations of people lived and died without knowing anything of the world we lived in. 19th century literature is special. There is so much heat, passion, confusion, pain and soul-searching in it - it feels so close, yet so far, from the world we live in. For me at least it is humbling and amazing that people like Tolstoy laboured on and left behind such vivid traces of their souls for us to discover and enrich ourselves with. Edit: I suppose this is a long-winded way of saying that the value of literature is that it helps you develop reverence and respect for the enormous reality and weight of history. Arrogance and shocking stupidity are the natural consequences of not realising your tiny place in history. The best literature breeds deep humility.
- mindcrime 14y ago
  Sure, I don't dispute any of that. And, in fact, I mentioned Anna Karenina partly because I bought a copy a few months ago because it is on my list of books to read. But I do question whether or not it has any particular value which exceeds any of the innumerable other works I could read with that time instead. Of course that might lead you ask "then why are you planning to read it"? To which I can only say "because it sounds interesting and exactly because I haven't read much Russian literature and I want to broaden my horizons a bit". But I'm not reading it because I want to be able to impress some hipster pseudo-intellectuals, or because it's something you're "supposed" to read. I just want to see what it's all about. Same with Crime and Punishment, which I started recently (but got distracted from and set aside temporarily). Mostly I would read Tolstoy for the same reason I would read Nietzsche - to break through our regrettable tendency to take the past and its people for granted. I agree with that, but I find that fiction from (and set in) Victorian era England has been my primary outlet for thinking about and appreciating the past in that regard. That's certainly not to discredit the Russian stuff you speak of, just saying that reading Tolstoy or Dostoevsky or whatever, isn't the only way to tap into that historical perspective. It's one thing to read about the ideas Nietzsche developed on a Wikipedia article, it's wholly another to read him in his own words and suddenly find yourself thrust into contact with a whole mind, a living, breathing bundle of thoughts and anxieties and dream, a human being palpably aching to find meaning, caught in the middle of one of the greatest social upheavals of human history. Indeed. I greatly enjoyed reading Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra and have quite a few of his other works on my list.

allenwlee 14y ago

do you mean you just stopped reading for pleasure at some point in your life? i can't imagine myself doing that.

jhales 14y ago
I still do, but I also get a lot of pleasure reading about what Taleb might call 'autistic things.'
- allenwlee 14y ago
  haha. me too.