i give up. i’ve been reading this book for the past two months in the slowest way possible: sentences stolen one by one as i wait for more important things. a bus, a train, an elevator, an arrival. i carried it to and from the city every day, up until i never took the book out of my bag for an entire week. now it’s lying in bed next to me, and i cannot even muster the energy to crack the spine. sorry mr. pirsig, i give up.
i initially picked up this book for two reasons, two very wrong reasons: it was free, and the title sounded famous. i’ll address the free issue later (nothing chris anderson-y here, just a horrible habit of taking home waaaay too many books each week simply because i can), it’s my response to the famous/classic titles that is at the heart of my problem. i tend to make reading choices based on what i should read, on what is expected to have been read.
i took a class in college simply because ulysses was on the syllabus, and, well, what kind of english major hasn’t read joyce? i ended up thoroughly enjoying the class and the book, but my motives were all wrong going into the thing. i wasn’t interested in joyce at all, and actually a bit scared at first, but i committed myself to the course and the book because i thought i needed to.
ugh.
i’ll point you to delgrosso’s recent post on reading for pleasure, which was the straw that broke my pirsig-reading back. while in the end i might enjoy a book, i’m working on pursuing titles that i actually want to read in the first place. last friday i went to mcnally jackson and paid $11.96 for audrey niffenegger’s the time traveler’s wife, and i started reading it on the subway this evening. you know what’s better than the silent approval of complete strangers for your smart literary choice? the smile that you can’t stifle because the book you’re reading is just so damn good.
