What I'm slow reading in 2024
Some books just take time...
What I’m slow reading during 2024
Last year, I listened to The Brothers Karamazov … all 36 hours of it. 😳 I calculated that if I took the whole year I only had to listen to six minutes a day, which I mostly did with varying levels of success. (Sometimes I’d fall behind and have to catch up on long drives!) Either way I highly recommend audiobooks for Russian literature because it is infinitely helpful in keeping all the characters and their three thousand nicknames straight.
My review of The Brothers Karamazov, for what it’s worth, is I get why it’s important but I found it tedious. Now, where do I collect my PhD in literature!?
Don Quixote by Miguel De Cervantes
I wanted to take on another bulky classic and had been hearing for a while that the newest translation of Don Quixote by Edith Grossman was fantastic. So, I’m reading three pages of the Spanish epic novel a day and should be done sometime in October! So far, I find Don and Sancho strangely charming and entertaining. Will that hold for 800 more pages? Who knows! But I’m excited to find out!
The Comfort of Crows by Margaret Renkl
When Megan Francis announced her So-Slow Book Club through Margaret Renkl’s The Comfort of Crows, I was all in. I’d never heard of Renkl before but the idea of a weekly reflection on nature’s passage through the seasons was deeply appealing to me.
The book begins with winter solstice and every week Renkl reflections seem to increase my own awareness of the small changes happening around my own yard. I even saw a fox days before I sat down to read her essay on foxes. It was eery and wonderful. Megan adds her beautiful touch with journaling prompts and discussion questions and every week has been a completely delightful experiences. My word for the year is cherish and this has been a weekly exercise in cherishing my surrounding world.
Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville
I’ve always wanted to read de Tocqueville’s classic reflection on American democracy. I know I read selections in college but I thought a slow trip through this masterpiece during a fraught year in American democracy seemed like a good idea.
Plus, we’re reading it together as a Pantsuit Politics community! Our premium subscribers will get access to mine and Beth’s conversations every other month on what we’re observing but of course anyone can join along and read!
When we interviewed Hillary Clinton, she also suggested Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life as a companion to Democracy in America so I picked that up to read when I’m finished. (If you are capable of resisting HRC’s personal reading recommendations, then good for you! I am not.)
I’ve really enjoyed building a practice of slow reading over the years. I find it’s a nice antidote to the drive to wrack up big numbers in my reading challenge. Investing a lot of time in a book I know will only show up as a +1 in that column is a good reminder that’s not the only reason I read…although I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought of keeping an annual page tally. 😉
Apparently I'm slow reading Babel by RF Kuang from 2022 until forever. Just can't get through it.
I'm intentionally slow reading The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche.
I started The Brothers Karamazov in January of 2023 but have let it lull around the 100-page mark now for almost a year. I am going to try the Serial Reader app to finish it. If you haven't heard of it, it's a free app that will serialize classics that are in the public domain, automatically giving you a bite-sized chunk to read each day. Audio may work well for me too - thanks for the recommendation.