Confessions of a Reader

This semester, something geeky happened in my Peace & War class. The professor was talking about how he was at a disadvantage in teaching undergrads because they are not as well-read as, say, grad students generally are. (This was intended in a less douchey sense than it comes off from this brief summary.) He then proceeded to list a number of works that he thought he would reference during the class, including Henry V and the St. Crispin's Day Speech amongst other works that weren't really obscure so much as not likely to be encountered pre-higher-education.

Woe, ye silly prof.

I let out a little snert, because I had read every one of them. Unfortunately, he heard me, and thought I was laughing at the idea that the modern student does not arrive at college well-read. I told him I agreed, but was still smiling, which he called me on, and I told him I'd read all of them. He looked startled, and then said "oh. Well...good for you! *beat* Nerd."

It's true, and I've accepted it. I learned to read early and didn't stop. When I was in elementary school, I was picking up everything that wasn't tacked down in the house, including things like Jurassic Park and Death of a Salesman. The point isn't really how much I read that early, because let's face it...your weltenschauung isn't big enough to deal with things like little pieces of rubber tubing in Willy Loman's secret stash. The point is that as far as I can tell, I was born starving for the written word, needing it the way most people need water and food. I have read some utter shit just because it was better than not reading at all, like the copy of the heinous Manhunt by garbage-producer Janet Evanovitch that I found on the T on a trip into Boston. Look, I'm on college break, free from books if I so choose until the 23rd (I know, longest break ever, no?), and my bedtime reading? Is Anna Karenina.

Before that, I was reading something else, and this is where the true confession comes in. I was reading Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen. I started reading it because I'd never read any Austen, and you know, you hear all about how great Austen is, one of the world's great authors, famous love stories, ELIZABETH AND DARCY EEEEEEEE and all that great stuff. Plus, that Jane Austen Book Club movie was coming out, the movie version of P&P with Keira Knightley was coming out, AND that one about Austen's life starring Anne Hathaway (which apparently was totally assy)...all signs pointed to it being time to finally check me out some Austen.

Oh my god, there are no words for how much I hate Austen.

I say this as someone who read Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray of her own free will. I got WRIST PROBLEMS from that shit, man. The vagaries of 17/1800s society are not what bore me. Maybe it's the wrong way to approach it, but my god, what could EVER be more boring than watching a bunch of weak-ass females fawn over men and be perpetually swayed by foggy intelligence? Gross. And let me tell you - I love me a good romance. Totally down with it. But why in the hell am I always hearing about Elizabeth Bennett being a strong heroine? Spare me the agony.

I feel like I'm doing something wrong by not liking Austen, but ugh, what a struggle to get through the dense writing and plodding plotline. No thank you, literary world, though I feel somewhat obligated to read Sense and Sensibility just to have the experience and build my literary base, but I am going to need to wash my brain out with some Tolstoy before I'm ready to hit the Austen again.

There, I said it.

And I'm not sorry.