Danielle recently had a look back at the 73 (!) books she read this year, which prompted me to do the same. Although I did better than last year, I read a mere 35 books (so far) this year, 17 of which I blogged. Twenty-two were nonfiction, including several true-life wilderness adventure memoirs. I also read 12 novels, including four Austen re-reads, and some Slaves of Golconda picks. The only new-to-me classics I read were Adam Bede and the first two books of the Bible.
What stands out to me is that very few of the books are part of the "canon" that I want to read. Most of the books were picked up on a whim, which would be fine if I was immortal and had plenty of time to attend to the classics "later." To be fair, the list does not reflect my ongoing (if glacially slow) studies in Latin, history, and art, but I think I could have done better.
I'm not the sort of person to make New Year's resolutions, but if I was, I might (theoretically) suggest to myself that when I hear about a cool book I should note it down rather than immediately put it on hold at the library. This would take advantage of my natural ability to put things off and my unnatural short term memory loss. I might also give myself permission to abandon or skim any (contemporary) books that aren't up to snuff. Other than that I'm not sure what I could do to devote more time to the great books. Perhaps I could read fewer blogs...? Nah!
