How to talk about books you haven't read

I really love that this article is in this course because, as a lover of literature, it really has made me question the source of this ‘profound anguish’ that I, like any person with in an interest or exposure to learning, constantly suffer when contemplating the sheer number of the books I will never read. It is a cruel irony that the more knowledge one obtains merely works to reveal to them how little they in fact know (was that Einstein?). This need for a ‘consolation’ of inadequate reading suggests that there is something inherent in literature that inspires anxiety in a way that other artistic mediums, such as visual art and film, don’t seem to—I would never fret about having not seen the Mona Lisa in the same way I do about my inability to finish Ulysses. This leads one to conclude that there must be a more significant social weight or value placed on the literary canon as a marker of one’s cultural sophistication.

Bayard attempts to diffuse this anxiety by asserting that the distance between reading and non-reading is far larger and more graduated than we like to think, thus complicating our perception of what it means to have 'read' or 'not read' something. This idea is explored somewhat in The Browser’s Ecstasy, which demonstrates a revolutionary way of reading- that is, getting brief glimpses of what may or may not be the essence of a book, and gaining pleasure or meaning from such a practice. This flouts the second rule of reading as expounded by Bayard: “the obligation to read thoroughly”. His discussion of skimming versus reading a book in its entirety raises questions of reading practice, in that there is actually more than one way of reading, and also makes us question what we expect or require from our reading practice.

All of this makes me question where the value really lies in books and reading. Is it just in talking about them, in which case one only needs to know, as Bayard suggests, its relation to other books in the literary canon? It is here that his argument (which I am inclined to belief is purposefully antagonistic), falls down, as it almost entirely ignores the possibility that a book’s actual worth lies in the pleasure of reading it, regardless of whatever social or cultural capital it may also possess. The second major flaw in his argument is that, while he is certainly correct in his belief that all one needs to know about a text is its place in the literary canon, (I myself having comfortably participated in several tutorials on Ulysses despite never having made it past the first page), such an argument is highly problematic, as it first of all requires that at least someone has read the book, in order to tell others about it, and that any knowledge or discussion of these books is limited to existing literary criticism; by not reading a book, your opinion of it and its canonical significance can never go beyond mainstream opinion, thus stagnating literary debate forever. It denies the possibility that there may be new ideas and new values to be found in one’s own reading of a text, and that future generations may have refreshing new views on old texts. Bayard does admit this fact himself, however finds the most significant flaw to be that it such dependence on others’ views makes it hard to achieve specificity in your discussions. But is being able to discuss a text ‘accurately’ sufficient? While Bayard certainly makes some valid and interesting points, I feel that the purpose is more to make us reassess our feelings towards the literary canon, and reading in general, rather than actually encourage us to give up reading entirely. As a reviewer in the Boston Globe stated, "I suspect Bayard may be winking at us all along".