BOOKS: A GIFT FROM THE AGES

“Reading is like eating Brussels sprouts.” Kanye West

The book was better than the movie. It almost always is. Unfortunately, the 23 to 28 percent of us who never read a book will never understand that.

Movies are in, books are out. “There’s more to your library than just books,” the television ad purrs as it pans an array of exotic equipment: records, CDs, computers, headphones and cassette players. People who never read books now use libraries to check-out movies.

Leathersmith of London added insult to injury by producing leather casings that look like classic books but are really video boxes.

Yoshio Sakurauchi, former speaker of Japan’s Parliament, said that not only are American workers lazy, but one third of us are illiterate. Americans were quick to condemn the statement, but there is some truth to it. Around the same time, our own Library of Congress labelled illiteracy – the inability to read or write – and aliteracy – the unwillingness to read by those who can – as “twin menaces.” The library estimated that twenty-three million adult Americans were functionally illiterate. Their hope is that we become a nation of readers, but with the cornucopia electronic entertainment at our fingertips, that is increasingly, and tragically, unlikely.

Not everyone loves books.

“Books are a mighty bloodless substitute for life,” wrote R.L. Stevenson.

“Nine-tenths of existing books are nonsense,” said the English novelist and politician, Benjamin Disraeli.

Eighteenth century philosopher, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who owes his continuing fame to the printed word, wrote, “I hate books, for they only teach people to talk about what they do not understand.”

Susan Akin, Miss America 1986, said, “I hate to read. I don’t get anything out of it. I never could stand to read. It bores me.”

What good are books? Let me count the ways.

1. Books are the foundation of civilization. They are repositories of the world’s accumulated knowledge. They are a trans-temporal communication system, a time machine that enables us to commune with people of the past and to send messages to the future.

2. Books ensure that the human story, in all its glory and gore, is stored for posterity. Books tell us where we’ve been, what we know, what mistakes we’ve made, and where we are going. They are storehouses of what we are.

3. They entertain, enlighten, enrich and instruct.

4. They create limitless horizons. They enable the crippled to walk on other planets, the blind to see, the ignorant to learn, the meek to be brave, and the bedridden to travel.

5. They allow us to see the world through different eyes. They enable doctors to be taxi drivers and taxi drivers to be doctors.

6. They create a network through eternity: a one-way conference call between the giants of the ages and us. Einstein read Freud. Freud read Darwin. Darwin read Madison; Madison read Voltaire; Voltaire read Locke and Newton. Newton read Descartes. Descartes read Roger Bacon; Bacon read St. Thomas Aquinas; Aquinas read St. Augustine; Augustine read Cicero; Cicero read Aristotle; Aristotle read Homer. And you get to read them all.

7. Because you are reading these words, you are among the most fortunate in human history. You are literate. You have access to the world’s accumulated knowledge. Every subject is available to build on, to enlighten, to enrich. Novels enable us to not only be entertained, but to be flies on the wall observing human stories, listening in on conversations and thoughts, observing dramas, foibles, hungers and tragedies.

Looking back around 1800 years, young John Adams derived pleasure from the ancient Roman orator and politician, Cicero.

The sweetness and Grandeur of his sound, and the Harmony of his numbers give pleasure enough to reward the Reading if one understood none of his meaning. Besides, I find it, a noble Exercise. It exercises my Lungs, raises my Spirits, opens my Porr, quickens the Circulation, and so contributes much to Health.

Louis L’Amour, whose western novels sold many millions of copies, had this to say: “Today, one can sit in the comfort of his own home and explore any part of their world or even outer space through books. They are all around us, offering such riches as can scarcely be believed.”

Terry Anderson also appreciated books.

On March 16, 1985, Anderson, a journalist in the Middle East, was abducted by Hezbollah militants in Lebanon; he was held for seven very long years. “I had about a year and a half in solitary [confinement]” he said, “which… nearly destroyed me.”

He was saved by books.

“You can imagine the difference it (books) makes in your life when you are locked in a room twenty-four hours a day.” For the last 2 ½ years of his captivity, “we got boxes of books…bad books, cheap books, thrillers, political science textbooks…”

My uncle’s life was destroyed when his two sons were born with Muscular Dystrophy. Unable to work he turned to drink while dedicating his life to do everything he could for his sons. He spent much of his time at the hospital as the boys grew weaker. Richard died at thirteen; Jonathan at thirty. In the end, Johnny was kept alive by tubes. He could only move his tongue.

My uncle’s solace was in books. Returning from the hospital, he would nestle into an easy chair in his den, light-up a cigarette and begin to read. Surrounded by bookshelves of novels and non-fiction covering anything and everything, he used the wonder of books to escape from his tormented life.

Another book lover was the fourteenth century Humanist, Francesco Petrarch. (1304 – 1374) Books were his friends. He described them as, “…always disposed to speak or be silent, to stay at home or make a visit to the woods, to travel or abide in the country, to gossip, joke, encourage you, comfort you, advise you, reprove you, take care of you, to teach you the world’s secrets, the records of great deeds, the rules of life and the scorn of death…”

Now Petrarch has joined his companions on my shelf. He is at my disposal. He is my friend. He has traveled six-hundred years into the future. He will be remembered far longer than that book-hating Miss America. (I bet you’ve already forgotten her name, and it’s only been a few paragraphs).

Renaissance writer, Niccollo’ Machiavelli (1469-1527), also loved books. Although posterity has branded him as sneaky, conspiratorial, and coldly pragmatic for writing The Prince, he too took great pleasure in his studies. Unable to work in the government, he retreated to his farm for many years where he worked the fields during the day and on his writing at night. After a long day in the fields, he wrote:

On the threshold I slip off my day’s clothes with their mud and dirt, put on my royal and curial robes, and enter, decently accoutred, the ancient courts of men of old, where I am welcomed kindly and fed on that fare which is mine alone, and for which I was born: where I am not ashamed to address them and ask them the reasons for their action, and they reply considerately; and for two hours, I forget all my cares. I know no more trouble, death loses its terrors: I am utterly translated in their company.”

SUBSTACK SIDEBAR

Petrarch and Machiavelli were describing what contemporary psychologists call “flow,” the mental state of being so intensely wrapped up in an activity, that time seems to melt away. To be so absorbed that everything outside what I call your flow bubble, almost ceases to exist. Inside the bubble, all is bright, compelling, and mesmerizing, capturing every neuron of one’s attention. Flow is pure absorbance in an activity.

Psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi described flow thusly:

My mind isn’t wandering. I am not thinking of something else. I am totally involved in what I am doing. My body feels good. I don’t seem to hear anything. The world seems to be cut off from me. I am less aware of myself and my problems.

“…being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.”

For those who can achieve it, flow is one of life’s consuming pleasures. It wraps us entirely in the present, isolating us in the bubble, and helping us to be creative, productive and entertained. Flow is a state of happy absorption. When reading a riveting novel we are experiencing flow.

Most days I experience flow. I’m experiencing it now as I type these words. When around other people I often slip into my flow bubble, in the bright inner world where I talk out loud, surrounded by a hazy reality.

“Dad, you’re talking to yourself again,” my daughter says.

I laugh and offer my standard reply. “It’s part my charm.”

Petrarch, Machiavelli and my uncle would have all understood.

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