r/books • u/GuyMontagz • May 12 '12

What are your reading habits?

For no particular reason I just wanted to know how some of you read. What time of day do you read most? Where do you read (home, coffee shop, work, etc.)? Do you listen to music while you read? If you have any other habits please share them with us!

123 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

196 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

21

u/[deleted] May 12 '12

I don't like listening to music when I read, because I feel it can conjugate emotions between the music and the words. When I read, I want the music to be in my head. Explosions in the sky are sick though.

My reading habits are: Go on a reading hype, read four or five books within a few weeks, then stop completely for a month. Rinse and repeat.

3

u/JennaSighed May 12 '12

The first time I read IT my boyfriend at the time was learning to play Harvester of Sorrow on the guitar. Now, whenever I hear that particular song it takes me straight back to 1958 Derry. I kind of love that.

7

u/[deleted] May 12 '12

For me it's ultimately emotionally distracting, but then I was never very good at multi-tasking, even sensory-wise.

The author didn't write the book with that song in mind. I wouldn't add my own music to a film, or any other piece of art work. On the one side, you can create those infinite neural bridges between two different mediums, but on the other side you can decry and devalue through association.

It also doesn't fit my format for reading. An album is like, what? Between 30 mins and an hour? I read for several hours at a time. And also, without knowing what you're about to read, you can't best select music to match what you're reading. You can end up with a weird emotional dissonance.

Also also, I like that reading is, for me at least, a silent activity. Sometimes something sudden will happen, and I'll gasp. I read Gatsby for the first time the other week, and it was late at night. The sharp inhale of breath I took during a certain point in the book almost shocked me. There's something rather intensely beautiful about that.

I can listen to music whilst creating, but not whilst consuming. It's considered a great culinary crime to add salt to an already seasoned, chef-prepared meal.

1

u/[deleted] May 13 '12 edited May 13 '12

I couldn't agree more, generally I'm baffled at how music is added to everything even without much thought put into it (films, advertisements, almost all indoors public space etc.). In the modern age it's become like some neurological season-all that's smeared over every activity. Listening to music is an activity on its own! It's maybe possible to listen while walking or biking, or on public transport, but it's never as enjoyable as when listening in the sofa or bed at home, or in the concerthall - because, for one thing, you need to close your eyes to fully enjoy music (it's even been proven scientifically, with brainscans) - and music needs just as much concentration, to be fully consumed/internalized, as books.

IMO, music particularly really flattens out sudden events and changes of athmospheres in books, but on the other hand I think most people listen to music, while reading, solely for the purpose of negating surrounding sounds and help them concentrate on the book (the so-called post-rock everyone is recommending to each other here is a music of very passive nature, or at least, it's very static). I think no author could be unhappy about that.