“Curiously enough, one cannot read a book; one can only re-read it. A good reader, a major reader, and active and creative reader is a re-reader.” (Vladimir Nabokov, Lectures on Literature)
These 2 quotes (and the one I post at the end from C.S. Lewis) prompted me to go back and scan my reading lists (those from the last 13 years were readily at hand) to ascertain just which authors and books are indeed my “go to” reads. I wasn’t surprised at the results. Indeed, the authors I’ve spent time re-reading in recent years were the authors with whom I’ve spent quite a lot of time all my adult life: Charles Dickens, C.S. Lewis, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Francis Schaeffer, John Buchan, Alexander Dumas, William Shakespeare, J.R.R. Tolkien, James Thurber, Walter Scott, Fyodor Dostoevsky, G.K. Chesterton, Malcolm Muggeridge, Randy Alcorn, Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, Joni Eareckson Tada, Jane Austen, Paul Tournier, James Barrie, and such historians as Walter Lord, Shelby Foote, Samuel Eliot Morison, and Winston Churchill.
Oh yes, the most recent discovery to make this “best friends” list is Jan Karon. And what a wonderful addition she is.
I have a few other repeatedly-read authors, particularly in the “sheer entertainment” category which encompasses mysteries, adventure, and historical fiction. Among them are Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, G.A. Henty, Erle Stanley Gardner, Alistair MacLean, C.S. Forester, John D. MacDonald, John Dickson Carr, etc.
Were there books that I re-read in this last 13-year period that came from authors besides my friends mentioned above? Yes, several in fact. Laura Hillenbrand’s Seabiscuit. Michael Ende’s The Neverending Story. Thor Heyerdahl’s Kon-Tiki. Christopher Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus. Walter Wangerin’s The Book of the Dun Cow. Lew Wallace’s Ben-Hur. Baroness Orczy’s The Scarlet Pimpernel. Edmond Rostand’s Cyrano de Bergerac. U.S. Grant’s Memoirs. Thornton Wilder’s Our Town. Boris Pasternak’s Dr. Zhivago. Edward L. Beach’s Run Silent, Run Deep. Richard Adams’ Watership Down. Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind. Armando Valladares’ Against All Hope. Booth Tarkington's The Magnificent Ambersons.
Now I’ve known for some time that a good deal of my reading was re-reading. But this little experiment revealed to me just how much. The lowest percentage of re-reading in this 13-year period was just over 25% with the highest being just under 60%. The average in the latest 5 years is between 45-50%. But it is definitely climbing as the years go by.
I guess in my aging years I’m enjoying spending more time with old friends than with new acquaintances. C.S. Lewis seems to agree. “To me, re-reading my favorite books is like spending time with my best friends. I’d never be satisfied to limit myself to just one experience each with my favorite people.”
