L“For friends... do but look upon good Books: they are true friends, that will neither flatter nor dissemble” - Francis Bacon, philosopher, author, self-important douche-bag.
When it comes to the most ostensibly earnest statements in the world “I’m a reader” is definitely numero one. It seems like you’re just revealing something about yourself, that you make a habit of reading, but what it really means is “I am smarter than you, you TV watching, knuckle dragging, shit-chucking ape of a Neanderthal-cannibal”. People who purportedly love reading rarely talk about books with you, they will talk at you. It’s like talking to a new mother about their baby or a car-lover about their car, just a constant stream of information that the recipient simply does not care about. Except unlike a new-mother or a car-fan, readers aren’t genuinely excited, they for the most part just want to impress you with the fact that while you’re busy with your video games they are developing into an intellectual genius. As if the simple act of reading a book is an impressive feat. It’s not. Anyone can read a book. If you’re reading this right now you can read a book, except I have the decency to keep these posts to less than five hundred words so you can go back to looking up nude pictures of that Cortana hologram from Halo (just take safesearch off google images. You’ll find what you’re looking for).
It doesn’t even matter what the person is reading either. You could read the Twilight saga and still consider yourself an intellectual heavyweight. That said, some reader-jerks will insist that the classics are the best. They will proudly list their literary conquests on facebook, as opposed to the more direct route of just posting their penis measurements. Have you read Crime and Punishment? It sucks. But if you decide to waste months of your life painstakingly (and it is painful) reading it then congratulations, you can now consider yourself better than all those better looking jerks who (rightfully) bullied you in high school.
Books used to be important. But now there’s television, movies, video games and the internet which are simply better. Reading books should be viewed as just an antiquated habit, but because of the fact that less people participate in the time-consuming process of book reading its status has elevated. What used to be something everyone did has now become an elite status symbol for those who pretend they don’t have anything better to do. Everybody used to read in the 1800s. And if the books of the 1800s are to be believed, they were all assholes.
Francis Bacon believed books to be the best of friends, similarly, William Feather famously opined that; "Finishing a good book is like leaving a good friend." Both men clearly never had any friends.
No comments:
Post a Comment