Fiction, non-fiction, what do you read?

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by 4691mls

Lately I've been thinking i should read some history since I didn't pay as much attention as I probably should have when I was in school. Haven't gotten around to actually doing it though....

I've mostly given up on reading history. Basically, most of our ancestors are not people I would want to meet on a well lit front street.

[Aleron Ives]

Originally Posted by DNSB

most of our ancestors are not people I would want to meet on a well lit front street.

That probably applies to most of our contemporaries, too.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Aleron Ives

That probably applies to most of our contemporaries, too.

I would not want to meet myself on a well lit front street.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I've mostly given up on reading history. Basically, most of our ancestors are not people I would want to meet on a well lit front street.

Actually I find exactly this fascinating. If our ancestors were like us in every regard, with modern values and principles, reading about history would be really boring. I hate it in fiction too, when the characters in a novel taking place in the past are basically modern people in costumes. If I wanted modern people, I'd read a modern novel, not a historical one.

Edit: this doesn't mean I want to live in the past or among people with outdated values. I don't. But I like to read how people thought and felt in the past and compare it to how we think and feel now. That is what makes history interesting.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Actually I find exactly this fascinating. If our ancestors were like us in every regard, with modern values and principles, reading about history would be really boring. I hate it in fiction too, when the characters in a novel taking place in the past are basically modern people in costumes. If I wanted modern people, I'd read a modern novel, not a historical one.

Edit: this doesn't mean I want to live in the past or among people with outdated values. I don't. But I like to read how people thought and felt in the past and compare it to how we think and feel now. That is what makes history interesting.

The difference to me is that in fiction, the character laying there with their intestines spilling out is not a real person. In history, it is real people who did the bleeding and dying. Perhaps I should try to avoid the military aspect of history but sadly, most of the decisions of the leaders meant nothing until they were enforced on the battlefield.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by DNSB

The difference to me is that in fiction, the character laying there with their intestines spilling out is not a real person. In history, it is real people who did the bleeding and dying. Perhaps I should try to avoid the military aspect of history but sadly, most of the decisions of the leaders meant nothing until they were enforced on the battlefield.

But that's not much different these days either. Just look at the news.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

But that's not much different these days either. Just look at the news.

Precisely. I don't need to read history to get my fill and more of blood and guts.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Precisely. I don't need to read history to get my fill and more of blood and guts.

Well, yes, if you read mostly military history. I've read mostly history dealing with culture, society, customs, everyday life and so on. Not battle descriptions. Not that the latter aren't important, I'm just not interested in them personally.

There's plenty of cruelty in other things than battles, of course, just like in our so-called modern times.

[haertig]

9.9

Everything I read these days is fiction, except for the rare technical manual - like to get a HAM radio license, learn celestial navigation, acquire a new programming language, etc. These non-fiction technical jaunts are rare for me these days. But a decade or two ago, they were ALL that I read.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Well, yes, if you read mostly military history. I've read mostly history dealing with culture, society, customs, everyday life and so on. Not battle descriptions. Not that the latter aren't important, I'm just not interested in them personally.

I don't need to read military history to get my fill and more of blood. Trivial items such the number of deaths expected on a ship at sea, the number of women dying in childbirth, the number of children dying before even reaching their first year, using sulphuric acid on windows to prevent them from frosting over, <fill in as many items as you can stand>. I'm talking about real history not the glossed over and cleaned up version seen in most historical fiction or the equally fictitious version masquerading as historical fact.

Originally Posted by Sirtel

There's plenty of cruelty in other things than battles, of course, just like in our so-called modern times.

Some of the cruelties from previous centuries have come close to being eradicated in most parts of the world leading me to some small hopes that process will continue.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I don't need to read military history to get my fill and more of blood. Trivial items such the number of deaths expected on a ship at sea, the number of women dying in childbirth, the number of children dying before even reaching their first year, using sulphuric acid on windows to prevent them from frosting over, <fill in as many items as you can stand>. I'm talking about real history not the glossed over and cleaned up version seen in most historical fiction or the equally fictitious version masquerading as historical fact.

Yes, death and suffering is everywhere, and not only in history. In the news. In nature. In real life here and now. There's no escaping it, whatever you read, watch or do. Yes, in some parts of the world there is less now than historically, but only in some, and only to a certain extent. I would not say the basic human nature has changed much at all, and I no longer have much hope that it ever will. Perhaps in a million years, if we last that long.

[John F]

Originally Posted by John F

I would give myself a 9.95.

Originally Posted by Arun

I'd say I'm around a 7 on that scale, leaning more towards fiction for personal reading. Fiction lets me escape and explore new worlds, but I do sprinkle in non-fiction for learning and personal growth.

I'm done growing. I'm probably shrinking.

[neil_swann80]

Originally Posted by John F

I'm done growing. I'm probably shrinking.

Vertically or horizontally?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by neil_swann80

Vertically or horizontally?

Mentally. In 3-D.

[John F]

Originally Posted by neil_swann80

Vertically or horizontally?

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Mentally. In 3-D.

Shrinking vertically and mentally.

Expanding Horizontally.