Reading books and that

I've just read If Nobody Speaks Of Remarkable Things by Jon McGregor after having it recommended to me very kindly in response to one of my posts below. It's quite wonderful, but I'm not going to write a half-arsed book review, rather just go on some equally half-arsed mental ramble.

What I realised was that I've not *read* a book in a ages. I've watched some whilst turning over the events of the day in my mind, or covered pages whilst trying to work out how they got the bass drum sound on the record I'm listening to, but not really read. I felt the same when I first heard Whispering Pines by The Band, that I was very much listening. Usually, when I read or listen I am doing a lot of the analytical things I've been trained (or trained myself with music) to do. That and working on placing it in my opinions of fashion, people, social class, history, whatever it may be. But on this read (and that listen) none of that seemed even slightly important

Perhaps the bast thing you can say about a creative work is that you have nothing to say, that it's said it all, all you can do is recommend it. We talk a lot in our little studio here in our winding down after recording having a lager and smoking too many cigarettes looking at the clock and counting the hours of sleep we are losing before work tomorrow sessions about the point of creating things. In fact I mentioned it the other day. But I've been thinking further now about whether what makes a reaction like the above is actually an objective brilliance of the work or just the perfect end of subjectivity. Not that my normal distractions have silenced, just that the work I'm enjoying has chimed in with them so perfectly that I am actually reading/listening to my preconceived feelings read back to me.

So what am I saying? Many things spring to mind, not all of them very sensible and mainly just that I've read a really good book.

Comments

[Peter]

Just a quickie to say that I read quite a lot on the train, and find that I "read" an awful lot more than a read. But I think that's OK, because you can't force those moments when it all comes together and you're awake and sensitive and alert, and the book is good and emotive and exciting, and everything that goes together to make up those moments of real understanding or appreciation - you just have to put yourself in the position where you'll be alive to them when they come along.