Change Your Mind (On the Reading of Junk)

[Ea]

Originally Posted by kindlekitten

personally I cannot enjoy Joyce's prose at all. his writing style is offensive, and now that I think about it, Meyer could be compared to his style. juvenile, incorrect, most laws of grammar tossed out the window....

Not that I have any opinions on Joyce (haven't read him) but you sound like you're itching for a fight

[Ea]

Originally Posted by dmaul1114

But I'll also reiterate what I said before, with the disclaimer that readings isn't my top hobby, with movies, tv, sports and video games all things I enjoy more.

I think reading has always been my top hobby. Even as a teenager, great language - good use of words - could still catch my attention.

[Sydney's Mom]

Originally Posted by Ea

Dont' you miss 'better' writing? Don't you miss being challended just a little bit intellectually?

I read cases all day - most are very well written. I also read IRS regs - not so much. I have certainly read enough to recognize bad writting, and also to recognize what style of reading is required. I can read a romance novel in an hour. It might take and hour to read one set of regs (10 pages).

[Penforhire]

Sydney's Mom probably reads enough difficult text at work. That could fulfill the 'mixed' reading that she quoted from SpiderMatt, making both of them still correct. I know it is true for myself. There are some days where my job is so mentally draining that all I have capacity to enjoy is junk reading or, ugh, TV.

[0utis]

Originally Posted by basschick

many "good" classics were once junk reading. there may be a way to differentiate junk reading from good reading, but much defining these categories are opinions, and differentiating opinions, at that.

Good point. When I was reading Jane Austen's Letters, sometimes she'd mention the serious authors of her day she was reading or intending to read. Most of them have slipped into oblivion. So, who knows. Maybe Pratchett will be the Mark Twain of the 25th century and Joyce will be forgotten. In any case, I intend to have fun. I keep my mind open and try many kinds of books, that's how I found out that Umberto Eco is a really entertaining writer or that some children's books aren't just for kids. But my main objective when reading is enjoying myself. If I come out of it 'improved', so it be, but that's just a bonus. I'd never criticize anybody's taste in books or music. It's food for the soul, and every soul has different needs.

[kindlekitten]

Originally Posted by 0utis

Good point. When I was reading Jane Austen's Letters, sometimes she'd mention the serious authors of her day she was reading or intending to read. Most of them have slipped into oblivion. So, who knows. Maybe Pratchett will be the Mark Twain of the 25th century and Joyce will be forgotten. In any case, I intend to have fun. I keep my mind open and try many kinds of books, that's how I found out that Umberto Eco is a really entertaining writer or that some children's books aren't just for kids. But my main objective when reading is enjoying myself. If I come out of it 'improved', so it be, but that's just a bonus. I'd never criticize anybody's taste in books or music. It's food for the soul, and every soul has different needs.

haha! I was just thinking Jane Austen was the "junk read" of her time!

[SpiderMatt]

Originally Posted by kindlekitten

haha! I was just thinking Jane Austen was the "junk read" of her time!

Well, the novel as a form of literature wasn't held in high regard back then, either. Jane Austen, among others, really helped change how people thought of them, even if it did take a generation or two to flush out the general societal biases. Compare that to the modern bias against graphic novels. Things have certainly changed over the last several decades, allowing graphic novels like Maus (the only graphic novel to ever win a Pulitzer) and Persepolis to rise to prominence. However, there is still a common view that graphic novels or comic books are for kids and shouldn't be taken seriously. It may be decades still before people start to go back and realize that certain comics from today have cultural relevance that we're just too close to see.

[Sonist]

Originally Posted by Sydney's Mom

I read cases all day - most are very well written....

LOL!

If they are tax cases, I bet there is a lot of fiction in there

Still, not what they give Bookers for....

[Sydney's Mom]

Originally Posted by Sonist

LOL!

If they are tax cases, I bet there is a lot of fiction in there

Still, not what they give Bookers for....

I have read tax cases done all in rhyme, I have read them with puns, set to music . . . . It taxes a real nerd, I know, but I think taxes can be funny!

[desertgrandma]

Originally Posted by 0utis

I'd never criticize anybody's taste in books or music. It's food for the soul, and every soul has different needs.

Well said.

[Katti's Cat]

Originally Posted by 0utis

It's food for the soul, and every soul has different needs.

Very well put.

Reading is just like everything else - tastes and needs differ. And thank God for that or we would have a limited range of authors to choose from.

[zerospinboson]

Originally Posted by Ben Thornton

Does he have any kind of evidence?

I would have thought that integrative, so called "right brained", thinking would be enhanced by reading a wide range of different material (both in terms of subject matter and "quality").

My advice would be the opposite - to actually sample something which you normally wouldn't in order to expand your horizons.

There is more than enough research that links working consistently below your previously-received level of education with cognitive decline, yes. This is not to say that reading a single fluff novel will make you retarded, but I don't think that's what the quoted author was trying to say.
Anyway, arguments about 'integrative thinking' are very nice, but to notice trends they have to be there. And while there are definitely patterns in romance novels (girl meets prince, girl bats eyelashes, girl becomes pregnant and enjoys a 'fulfilling life' in tent of bedouin), they are not necessarily very interesting ones. GIGO applies. There is no reason to expect that "different material" will only reliably expand horizons when you vary both the subject and the quality; varying the former should be more than sufficient.

Originally Posted by Sydney's Mom

You are going to criticize me because I read romance novels? Frankly, I find people with a broad range of interests more interesting than those without. [...] Who is more deserving of criticism in your mind - someone sitting on the train reading a romance novel, or someone drinking a beer and fighting with his girlfriend on the phone?

I'm confused. What does "having a broad range of interests" have to do with reading both 'low' and 'high' culture works?
Are "interests" only broad when people say they are interested in baseball alongside information theory? Because I really don't get that argument, even if I've heard it more than a few times now.

[Sonist]

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

There is more than enough research that links working consistently below your previously-received level of education with cognitive decline, yes. This is not to say that reading a single fluff novel will make you retarded, but I don't think that's what the quoted author was trying to say.
...
There is no reason to expect that "different material" will only reliably expand horizons when you vary both the subject and the quality; varying the former should be more than sufficient.
...

I have to agree, all good points.

As an aside, would it not have been more more straightforward, if you had chosen the moniker "standingstillbison," with the correct spelling?

(I know, I know..., I just couldn't resist....)

[Tattncat]

I was taught by my Grandmother (who used to teach in one of those old little red school houses on the prairie) that no matter what you read you can learn something from it. Even if it's how not bo behave.

She encouraged me to read any and everything and to this day, I do. I have never regretted it.

[dioib]

Originally Posted by Tattncat

I was taught by my Grandmother (who used to teach in one of those old little red school houses on the prairie) that no matter what you read you can learn something from it. Even if it's how not bo behave.

She encouraged me to read any and everything and to this day, I do. I have never regretted it.

Sometimes the only material lesson one can learn from an equivalence class of things is its futility and scaled to the finiteness of life, I personally see no point in repetition.