\u201cHow to Talk About Books You Haven\u2019t Read\u201d by Pierre Bayard<\/p>\n
The irony of a non-reading professor issuing reading assignments to his students, and authoring a book presenting non-reading techniques on how to talk about books you haven\u2019t read, is not lost on me.\u00a0 As I read \u201cHow to Talk About Books You Haven\u2019t Read\u201d, Bayard relieved me of the pressure to read every book I come across and even granted me permission to speak about the books as if I have read them, or at best, skimmed them.\u00a0 It was comical how much time and effort he spent on writing a book on how not to read, almost as if he\u2019s committed to not reading books and persuading others to be non-readers. When describing his students attempting to discuss books they haven\u2019t read, he speaks with admiration as he says, \u201cAnd it is also unsurprising that their comments-however far removed from the initial text\u2026bring to the encounter an originality that they would undoubtedly have lacked had they undertaken to read the book.\u201d (Kindle, 1182). This statement was laugh out-loud funny to me.\u00a0 Where was he when I was in school?\u00a0 I would have loved a teacher who admired my originality and creativity in feigning an interpretation of an assigned book I hadn\u2019t read.<\/p>\n
I thoroughly enjoyed the advice offered to avoid potentially embarrassing situations when you haven\u2019t read the book but are expected to have read it. After a whole chapter discussing the unfortunate event you find yourself meeting the author of the book you haven\u2019t read, he summarizes it with this one sentence: \u201cpraise it without going into detail\u201d, as the author just wants to know \u201cthat you like what he wrote.\u201d (Kindle, 1350).\u00a0 Or in other words \u201cjust stroke the author\u2019s ego\u201d.\u00a0 Again, he offers sound yet subtle advice when discussing a book with someone you love.\u00a0 By using the movie Groundhog\u2019s Day, he emphasizes the importance of connecting with people by becoming interested in others and expressing kindness verses making a connection in matching wits with literature reads. \u00a0He stresses the importance of sharing the \u201cinner library\u201d with someone being helpful in building a romantic compatibility, but not as critical as building a caring connection.<\/p>\n
Sage advice was subtly and discreetly scattered throughout the book.\u00a0 Dismissing the shame about not reading thoroughly and being true to ourselves in the learning process was music to my ears.\u00a0 He encouraged his readers to be free from sounding or acting cultivated but to spend our energy on being our authentic selves throughout the learning process.\u00a0 As a therapist, I find myself constantly helping people recover from internal shame, and I found myself releasing the shame from my own unsuccessful educational experiences. \u00a0I really loved this beautiful, freeing advice from an academic mind who would traditionally chide me for not reading more thoroughly.\u00a0 In an academic world, it is common to feel foolish or silly if you don\u2019t understand the concepts and to give the impression you do.\u00a0 I look forward to applying his non-reading principles, avoiding performance with learning, and enjoying the learning process that is true to me.<\/p>\n
Ironically, I just found myself talking about the book Moby Dick to a zealous student who is undertaking the arduous read. I began to discuss the underlying theme in the book as if I read it, then paused to confess \u201cI haven\u2019t read it\u201d before continuing the discourse.\u00a0 After reading this book, I don\u2019t feel obligated to confess this and will carry on unapologetically, not in an effort to impress but rather to connect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cHow to Talk About Books You Haven\u2019t Read\u201d by Pierre Bayard The irony of a non-reading professor issuing reading assignments to his students, and authoring a book presenting non-reading techniques on how to talk about books you haven\u2019t read, is not lost on me.\u00a0 As I read \u201cHow to Talk About Books You Haven\u2019t Read\u201d, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":86,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[477],"class_list":["post-9454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bayard","cohort-lgp7"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/86"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9454\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}