Books and New Language
18 May
Many people wonder why I read so many books. It is a peculiar habit. I’ve actually turned down sex once because I was reading. (I said “once” so wipe that smirk off your face.) The answer is simple enough because it’s rooted in an experience that’s universal for anyone who’s read even a handful of books. You’re sitting there just humming along with no idea that you’re life is about to change forever when WHAM the damn author says the very thing you’ve been wanting to say but couldn’t quite express, couldn’t quite form your lips into the correct shape to utter those sacred words, and now she’s given you the very thing you’ve been searching for. It’s the moment when the author gives you new language – language that helps make sense of your experience.
Language matters. Give a person a new vocabulary and you’ve literally given them the tools to process and articulate their experience at a whole new level. We all have feelings and intuitions about the world but it’s not until we receive language that we’re able to clarify and articulate exactly what “it” is we’ve been grasping for.
Summer is here. It’s the time that our culture ever-so-slightly taps the breaks and we all have just a bit more time for ourselves.
Read a book. Heck read 20 books.
Yeah great post, I think the more one reads the better, the more likely they are to find the truth, look at the level of reading in the 1600′s through the early 1900′s where I think the two great awakenings were strong and carrying the culture, of course that is because of the Spirit of God, but reading and scholarship is a byproduct of that in my opinion, and look at the lack of reading in the middle ages and now a days and we see a dark ages back then and today, a lit up and tech savvy intellectual dark ages in many ways.
Michael Tyrrell who used to tour with Jason Upton said men used to be hearty and talk like scholars, I think that is a good thing, may we be men and women like that! Going to take your encouragement and order a Henri Nouwen book soon.
A timely post – I’m getting together my summer reading list! During the semester, when I’m teaching, I read very little voluntarily except fluff – I just can’t take on more work. So I always look forward to the summer, when reading and thinking are more joy than drudgery. I’m working on some Hauerwas now!
Here, Here!
Couldn’t agree more. I’ve found I tend to get stuck reading a certain genre or what I’m comfortable with unless I make a specific plan to have a reading list that includes:
Biographies
Technical books
Business
Psychology
Poetry
Fiction
Bad writers
Great classics
Etc.
The main point is a plan to exercise various parts of my brain with the goal to keep growing and evolving and not get in a rut only reading books by those I agree with or find familiar.
Read on friend!
@Kyle: I’ve never read any Henri Nouwen but I’ve seen him in the bibliography of many writers I know and respect (Brian Mclaren comes to mind). I hope it’s an enlightening experience!
@Brittany: Huerwas is a great mind and he freaking loves the church. I’ve listened to a few interviews/talks of his and that definitely shines through.
@Charlene: A plan is a great idea. Otherwise it seems that a book that should takes a week stretches out for a month.