Reading in Public No. 101: An ode to literary inefficiency
Yesterday I listened to Ezra Klein interview Gary Shteyngart and I felt like the conversation was tailor made for me. First of all, I think about Super Sad True Love Story at least weekly. I liked the book when I read it, but had no idea of the horrifying staying power it would have as we careened towards the dystopia it depicts. Hearing about Shteyngart himself reflect on his prescience was fascinating in and of itself. But the conversation also veered into why anxious, voicey novels are the marker of contemporary literature, how Puritanical Protestant work ethics continue to infiltrate American culture today, and why sitting on your porch meeting your neighbors adds joy to a life—all topics near and dear to my heart.
And then there’s a moment when they start talking about inefficiency and Klein asks Shteyngart if he thinks efficiency and beauty are at odds with each other. It stopped me in my tracks because this is something I think about all the time in my life, particularly my reading life. I’ve written before about how I feel the urge to hack or optimize my reading when I spend too much time online. I love the book side of the internet. Here I am after all writing this newsletter, and I’m still showing up on Bookstagram a dozen years after posting my first book picture. But I also know that once any activity moves into the realm of social media highlight reels, the activity itself changes. Algorithmic media—because, let’s face it, it’s hardly social anymore—rewards efficiency and optimization (not to mention sameness and trends, but that’s a post for another day).
There is nothing inherently wrong with wanting to improve our reading lives by making them more efficient. I myself want to read more. I want to find more books I love and adore! And of course it’s essential to note that when 25% of Americans aren’t reading a single book in a year, it’s much more important to get people reading at all and finding books they love than slowing down or pushing through a maximalist, “inefficient” text.
And yet I do think there are many “inefficient” habits that make reading much richer for me personally. There is so much beauty, wonder, and excitement to be found in the small moments of inefficiency, friction, and struggle and so today I’m sharing some of the (many) ways “inefficient” reading brings me joy. I’d love to know yours!
Rereading books. I often hear readers say they couldn’t possibly reread a book when there are so many other books they want to read in their lifetimes. I get it—I really do! But while reread is the most inefficient thing I could do when it comes to checking books off my TBR, I find it to be such a rich reading experience. There’s no way I’ll ever finish all the books I want to read in this life, butI know revisiting a favorite or giving a complicated book a second look will be valuable.
Rereading passages. Sometimes when I don’t totally understand a passage I’ve read or realize that my eyes have glazed over a bit while reading, I just keep trucking along knowing I’ll figure it out somewhere along the line. This is efficient, and it often works, especially for someone like me who has a high tolerance for confusion. But stopping and rereading, while less efficient, is so valuable to me. When I do this, I can get deeper than what is happening in the plot and into how the author is crafting the story with their choices.
Reading big books. Obviously long books are “inefficient” if we’re trying to meet a number-of-books reading goal. I’ve also noticed a lot of reviews of long books that say something along the lines of “it didn’t need to be that long” or “the author could have cut 100 pages and still said the same thing.” Sure, sometimes books truly feel padded, but also who cares?! Novels are not supposed to be efficient message delivery vessels. They are about enjoyment and pleasure and getting lost in a world. Very few stories “need” to be 600+ pages long and picking them up should be about the pleasure of inefficiently making my way through deliciously maximalist prose.
Reading books that make me work. I enjoy books that go down easy, but I also like the friction involved in reading a book that really makes me work for it. I’m more than okay with rereading passages, looking up vocabulary, and reading additional materials because once I’ve done all that, I feel like a book is really mine. When you struggle through and for an idea and come to truly understand it, it becomes part of you, and the same is true with a book.
Reading in print! I like audiobooks because I can read a book while doing other things, but I love reading in print because I can’t simultaneously do anything else at all! It is glorious to do nothing but read, and I think we should celebrate it as much as we celebrate being able to read while while folding laundry.
Subvocalizing while I read. I’ve trained myself to be able to read pretty quickly when I want to, but my preferred way to read is to slow down and subvocalize, or say the words “out loud” in my head. I can’t overemphasize how much this slows me down, but it’s also the only way I personally can truly appreciate the language of a text and feel like I’m really sinking into it.
Not choosing my next book while I’m still reading my current one. I have written before about how momentum matters when developing a reading habit, and that is absolutely true. If I don’t know what book I’m going to pick up next, I can lose steam and go a few days without reading anything at all. But sometimes that’s a good thing. When I pause before diving straight into a new book, it gives me time to reflect on and internalize what I read. I remember books better and keep the feeling of a story with me longer when I give myself some breathing room after finishing.
Going to an independent bookstore. This week I listened to the lovely Annie B. Jones talk on Instagram about why Prime day hurts independent bookstores but also how independent bookstores don’t have the same goals as online retailors. Within that message she talked about how she wants friction and messiness and inefficiency in her life, valuing connection over convenience and efficiency. I couldn’t agree more. Yes, it’s convenient to order whatever book I want from Amazon, but it’s also a soulless experience. And visiting an independent bookstore can be inefficient. I have to drive somewhere, look for parking (my nightmare), interact with strangers (not my strong suit), and then they might not even carry the book I’m looking for! But it’s always worth it. The human interaction, the possibility of discovery, the investment of time and resources into my community—it’s exactly the type of inefficiency that we all need more of.
Listening to audiobooks on a slower speed. There was a time when I was powering through audiobooks at 2x speed and finishing so many more books every month because of that. But then I realized that I was finishing these books without really immersing myself in them. Some people can listen to their books at chipmunk speed and still absorb the details, but I am not one of those people. Now that I’ve slowed back down to 1.25-1.5, I once again feel like I’m reading my audiobooks, which is more important to me than getting to more of them.
Using the library. I’m not here to call the library inefficient. It’s a magical institution run with both efficiency and heart and librarians are true heroes. But my personal use of the library is wonderfully inefficient. I don’t get on holds lists early or create alerts in Libby, I just read books as they become available. It often requires waiting longer than I’d like, but the wait makes the arrival notification all the sweeter.
Reading a spontaneous discovery instead of what I had next on my TBR. Sometimes I frustrate myself because I really struggle to get to the books I want to read. I have so many TBR books that I know I would love—many sitting on the shelves in my home—and yet I often get distracted by a recommendation from a friend or finding a new-to-me book at the bookstore. But even though I hate to think of all the great books languishing on my reading list, some of my favorite reading experiences are times when I hear about a book in a surprising way and then picking it up without overthinking.
Tell me your thoughts! What are your least efficient reading habits and why do you love them? What has inefficiency added to your reading life?
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Happy reading!
