As someone who likes reading, I know that there’s a certain overwhelming pretentiousness that comes with delving into some of the heavier stuff; especially if you decide to do it outside (which I like very much).
It’s the sort of gut feeling of revilement and alienation that comes with seeing some nerd perusing James Joyce’s “Ulysses” (or, even worse, “Finnegans Wake”) somewhere in public.
The immediate reaction, I think, to seeing that seated figure perched over “Infinite Jest”: “Oh, what a snob/hipster/pretentious jerk. Look how cool they thinks they are.”
This isn’t shocking. People who love books often have a sort of snooty, reactionary attitude to people who just are not interested in picking up Marcel Proust.
I can’t tell you how many times, talking to well-read friends, there’s a common lamenting and rending of garments about the death of the written word and those illiterate plebeians who would rather watch Netflix than read John Milton.
That petty snootiness is real, and it happens a whole lot among groups of relative outcasts (myself included) who take refuge in the thoughts and mumblings of people long dead.
I get uncomfortable and try my best to stay silent when that conversation comes up.
I think there happens to be a whole lot more moral weight in, say, the Netflix shows “Breaking Bad” or even “BoJack Horseman” than in the heavy-handedness of C.S. Lewis or the newest Haruki Murakami book (fun, but, as much as I hate to say it, just not very good at all).
On a related note, not only is there a general public backlash against the lit-snoots themselves, but also the books they read. Many a piece of real engaging literature is consigned to the dustbin of public consciousness because “it’s what ‘those’ people read.”
It just isn’t fair to the author, who has put so much of themselves into a single, portable and purchasable form, designed on some level to be of use to others.
Again, it’s true, many people who read books like the aforementioned “Infinite Jest,” could fit into the hipster/jerk stereotype.
While the book itself is shamelessly unpretentious and unironic, it does seem to attract those who like reading big books in public more than reading the books themselves.
(These people are known as “one-third” readers, who will go try to muscle through a long book and ending up with a single dog-eared page about a third of the way into the novel.)
But, literary snobbery aside, there is some really worthwhile stuff in these books. Real nitty-gritty no-nonsense drops of pure wisdom that stick to the mind.
And the hard truth is that people who choose to read books, poetry or prose have access to a much vaster well of experiences and thoughts from the ancient past to the interminable present than those who choose to decline.
In the distant past, when being literate and being able to afford books were considered luxuries, the deep tie between literature and elitism was inextricably formed. Now that everyone has to read to function in a wider society and it has become a choice instead of a privilege, the same root-level connection has stayed.
While it sometimes seems that the “deeper” books are just exercises in intellectual self-pleasuring (and there is some of that, for sure), reading both wide and deep can give you the ability to see yourself in the eyes of others for an extended period of time.
Like Robert Burns opined: “O wad some Power the giftie gie us/ To see oursels as ithers see us!” He is most probably talking about God here, but I think literature does the same thing. It helps you develop a sense of empathy with those in different situations.
The highest-quality stuff gives you the ability to see all sides of an issue and make your own decisions from there.
So next time you see some pretentious-looking fella lurking under a tree like some would-be Socrates with a large, clustered chunk of papers, remember: don’t judge a book by its readers.