Reflections on reading – a personal reading history.

I don’t remember learning to read. It seemed to be something that was always with me. I can’t imagine living in a world surrounded by alien signs and symbols designed to exclude me. From age two or three I remember clutching my seven paper library tickets every Saturday morning in exchange for seven new books. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Spot the Dog, Topsy and Tim. The joy I felt on my fifth birthday at five slim mauve Puddle Lane tomes sitting on the shelf, glossy and brand new. Didn’t bend over the corner, didn’t crack the spine. Next came the teen section: Saddle Club, Judy Blume. I ploughed through Jane Eyre and Little Women dutifully, but my heart lay in Sweet Valley. During these years I picked up US vernacular, speaking of car trunks, sidewalks and the confusion over ‘pants.’ I hoovered up Point Horror and sheepishly absorbed romances, even at that age knowing them to be trite and formulaic. I learnt of complicated teenage problems: drug abuse, unwanted pregnancies and the mortifying shame of tripping over in the school play.

Once I had finished the available books for adolescents I moved on to adult texts. Most of them looked boring (I did, at that age, judge a book by its cover) but the shiny-covered crimes and horrors drew me in. The Shining and Pet Cemetery gave me nightmares, but the latter did provide the perverse joy of saying ‘fuck’ when asked to read aloud in class from my current book. It was swiftly removed, much to my confusion. How can a word be wrong if they print it in a book? I shrugged and went back to Adrian Mole measuring his ‘thing’ and worrying about Thatcher, whoever that might be. I shunned the school library choices and borrowed, swapped or bought any books I could. I was fortunate enough to have parents who, though not avid readers themselves, were keen to provide their little darlings with as many books as they could read. I imagine they were relieved it was those we were asking for rather than Gameboys or trainers, and every year there were ten new novels wrapped up under the tree. The teachers left me well alone, seeing my reading had developed into an intuitive awareness of form and structure, along with a desire not only to read but to write. I dutifully supplied reams of creative writing when asked to ‘describe, explain or inform’, my imagination running wild and no doubt supplying odd insights into the bizarre mind of a teenage girl. I started on Bliss, Sugar and Just Seventeen. My mum would point out that I was still years from seventeen, but I would just smirk and point out that knowledge is power. She couldn’t argue with that and left me to it.

This reading was all well and good, but by sixth form I was seriously lacking in my knowledge of the canon. I started to adore the linguistic dexterity of Atwood and Amis (the younger), but the stuffy Victorians left me cold. I went to university interview ignorant of all the texts that I did not know existed. Instead I spoke of Ian McEwan and Zadie Smith, touching on the counterpoints of art and science, and picking apart the language of despair. Fortunately my love of the theatre had grown into a love of Shakespeare and my impassioned argument for the compulsory study of Shakespeare clearly warmed the tutors’ cockles. I still firmly believe that Shakespeare should be studied by all students at all schools and that his language and his ability to initiate debate is accessible to everyone on some level. William, you’re my hero.

University opened up a new world to me. Reading became more than a solitary activity, and being constantly challenged by tutors and peers fuelled my love of books. Then came the realisation that English was actually difficult, having spent so many years racing ahead only to be bottom of the Oxford pile. I spent most days skim reading texts, my enjoyment only slightly marred by the time pressure and the twice-weekly essay panic. I discovered that academics even wrote books about books; that I could read other people’s thoughts and theories, parroting them in essays before I had any ideas of my own. The degree-level work took away my fear of complex books, I felt if I could read Poems of the Pearl Manuscript barely in English then no tricksy letters from the council or bank could foil me. Never again could someone assume I wasn’t bright, that I didn’t understand what they were saying, or that I wasn’t well educated because of my accent or postcode or the name of my secondary school. I could read Middle English, complete with Ash and Thorn, and I was proud of meeting the challenge. Every time I think I can’t figure something out I remember the Pearl poem and keep trying.

Post-university I felt out of practice, my brain turning to mush and struggling to find words. I continued to read modern novels (Coetzee, Murakami, Shriver) but missed the stimulation and variation. I took creative writing night classes, dissecting stories by my peers, and started reading TV scripts for production companies and freelancers. I read books about the craft, studying Robert McKee and Russell T Davies. In a day job where texts were limited to powerpoint slides and poorly constructed sales documents tube journeys were essential to catch up on my reading. I am immensely looking forward to having a job where reading is essential, and the idea that I can introduce books to students who have none in their home, or believe they hate reading. One day I hope to run into a student on the tube, who insisted on reading 4-4-2 magazine or Nuts at school, clutching a Chuck Palahniuk or Bret Easton Ellis and reminding me that I once told them they might like it.