[Salgueiros]

I try not to judge.

Many people i have met read and continue reading truckloads of books but read always the same variation of a single book, or only read a certain genre or are strangely fearful of books with flowery words of strange plots, structures, characters or ideas. I always have this idea of books serving as an enlightenment as well as a pleasure function that sometimes i feel completely absent in an avid book reader.

It is the curiosity, the questioning and the search that attracts me on someone else's intellect, and unfortunately that does not come automatically by reading a "book". Sad as it is, some people read the same way as they eat or buy groceries, in a purely functional way. Anything new or unknown in a book is something to be disliked, feared even. Reading is way less worthy if it is not challenging, makes you question something, presents something new to you. Or inspires you.

Having said this, i found not at all uncommon to find a non reader (or a non-big reader) more interesting and witty than, say, a person who only reads sci-fi, or romance, or the same contemporary fiction, or easy books, etc, etc.

I also think there are books and books. Some books are terrible, while others sublime. And i think that although some variability in taste is normal i think there is a canon that defines the landscape where good literature might be or might obey and definitely a place where nothing but garbage is likely to grow. Subjectivism has its limits... so between someone who reads only garbage and someone who does not, i think actually the non reader might win!

Fortunately, there are many ways to learn and be open to the world, though i think books are the best.
So having books is a good start, but not a absolute sign. Absence of books is a thing to notice but not a deal breaker. It is the inside that matters.