Are we escapists?

[RickyMaveety]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

Even with my anti-religion bias, I'm having a hard time seeing how that confusion could have been made...

It had more to do with the nuns turning me away at the door of the convent and being pretty desperate to find a place to sleep. I thought the place was a hotel ... really, I did .... and I suppose it was technically, except that the only people who rented rooms did so by the hour and there were several rooms that housed "working girls" on a regular basis.

Top it off with the fact that my Catalan never was very good so I wasn't on the best of foundations communication-wise.

[pshrynk]

[Alphapheemail]

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

Eh .... the OP's friend will probably lapse into early senility as a result of allowing his brain to atrophy .... prevention of that is another good result of lots of READING.

Very possible! unless he's learing to "DIY" every single doable thing. Which i doubt!
Maybe i should get him a Escapist Reading DIY

[Alphapheemail]

pshyrnk:
<3 the cartoon. tho. most reads on MR are free and privide endless oportunities to travel to the stars and beyond.

[RickyMaveety]

Originally Posted by Alphapheemail

Very possible! unless he's learing to "DIY" every single doable thing. Which i doubt!
Maybe i should get him a Escapist Reading DIY

Originally Posted by Alphapheemail

pshyrnk:
<3 the cartoon. tho. most reads on MR are free and privide endless oportunities to travel to the stars and beyond.

Maybe you should get him a DIY on "How to be a Fully Functioning Human Being" ... sounds like he could certainly use that.

And re the cartoon ... not to mention that a good book usually takes much longer to enjoy than some movie. In fact, once you factor in the cost of tickets, and things that usually go along with a movie (such as dinner out, parking, in theater snacks and drinks), even if you pay full price for a book, you are still ahead financially. Plus the fact that you can always pick the book up and read it again (if you like to do that, and I do), and the second, third, fourth, fifth (ad infinitum) go is always free. I've never seen a theater or theme park offer that sort of deal.

[PieOPah]

I have loved reading ever since I can remember. For the most part, I read because I enjoy it. Part of the reading is escapism. Since I no longer have as much time to read as I once did, most of it is spent travelling to and from work on the train/bus. So, when I read, I am escaping the otherwise boring journey.

It still makes me smile to look up from a book and realise just how engrossed I was with absolutely no awareness of my surroundings...

[Sydney's Mom]

I am reading a book where the hero tells the heroine he wants to talk about their relationship. Yup, that ain't real life!

[snipenekkid]

reality is for people who cannot handle expanding their minds by reading or experiencing life outside the confines of their cubicle or McMansion.

[v1m]

Originally Posted by Alphapheemail

He ended the convo by saying that he felt that people who had their noses so much in other worlds and lives were just trying to escape from their own realities.

Well, since he's so seriously engaged, someone's on the job. I'll feel free to go on escaping, then.

Honestly, though, I usually think of reading lit as entering into life even more deeply.

And there's a correspondence, an exchange. You can be shaped by what you read as much as by what you eat.

A line of poetry from Auden or Sassoon; a hilarious bit out of Heller; something vulgar and brilliant out of Mailer; the cool griefs of Duras; the bite of Amis; the wind-up nightmares of H. Ellison; the abysses in Lovecraft; they pop into my head at all sorts of weird times. . .recollections of what they intended and strange mirrors on what I've become by reading them.

If I want just to escape, and who doesn't sometimes, I damn well can. Isn't that why the Flying Spaghetti Monster invented video games?

[ruskie]

Considering I tend to be disconnected from reality(healthy vivid expansive imagination) most of the time I'd find it hard to call it escapism. Infact other than calling it entertainment/fun/whatever would be a waste of effort(no not time time is infinite or as near so for all practical intent and purpose).