Hornby's How to Read Books

Eli Pardue
8/18/08
Brit Lit
Mrs. Pfanschmidt

Nick Hornby has a philosophy on reading much akin to my own. He believes that reading should be a recreational activity in the same way that television is. When you watch television, if you do not like the program you arre watching, you change the channel. A paradox that Hornby notices is that many people force themselves to read large, critically acclaimed books that they absolutlely despise. Because of this, people have begun to identify reading as a menial, boring, mentally exhausting (rather than stimulating) activity. At the same time, people are frightened to read books that are ridiculed for being low on the intelectual scale (Hornby references The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown). In responce to this observation, Hornby makes the point that it does not matter what you read, just that you do read. Reading at any intellectual level provides more of the intellectual stimulation quickly dwindling from our society. So, Nick Hornby suggests a wildly abstract idea to help people enjoy reading: pick books you know you will like. Personally, I pick books that are fantastical and exciting because i like being deposited in another realme when I read. I would not enjoy reading a 20th century politician's biography, and so I choose not to. Hornby argues that reading is entertaining, people just need to remeber how to make it so.