I’m faced with the dilemma yet again: is it possible to cheat at reading - an altogether non-obligatory, leisure activity, that we take upon ourselves? If so, then why? What is it that makes us cheat at this activity that we could instead abandon? And how do we cheat at all?
The answer as to ‘why’, might lie towards the end of following question: assuming that we could abandon reading all together, should be reason enough for us not to cheat. But the caveat is, we cannot choose to abandon reading, even if we could. Sometimes, like in this case for me, it is a somewhat required reading for some exam, and although we could study about the book instead of reading it, the reader part of us would feel useless and disrespected – hence we have to read the book.
At other times, it is the pressure: peer pressure, widely acclaimed popularity pressure, recommendations pressure, prize pressure, and so on. You just have to read it, for amongst readers, such conservative dogmas continue to exist, even if, individually, everyone of us refuses to give in – these subconscious requirements continue to gnaw at us. Then, there are more personal reasons: the fact that you don’t like to discontinue the book, believing that you’d never pick it up again in the future. Or that you feel guilty for not reading through the book. Or the fact that your money would be deed wasted if you do not read the book.
Combine all these factors, and the leisure activity that we take on ourselves, begin to take a more serious and demanding nature. And rightly so, albeit in some cases, for if we do not take a responsible attitude towards reading books, which are, indeed, a very important feature of human civilization and progress, then we might run the risk of missing the point all along.
‘Cheating at its core is a weakness’, it dawned on me the other day. We unwantedly feel obligated to read certain books, which is a weakness away from self-freedom. Given the reason that it is obligated reading, the experience of it would almost certainly be unsavoring. But since we have to read and finish the book, in order to understand it, we cheat – that is to say, we rely on something else, other than reading the book, to reach our ends.
Enter SparkNotes: both my savior and the source of my guilt; something I want to forget about, but recall instantly when a book needs to be wrapped up in a few hours. But if we don’t read a book, page by page, could we then, at all, have any weighted opinions about it? I mean yeah, you read the story in a few pages, read some analysis about the book – but you didn’t read the book. It is like feeling satiated by going through the process of cooking and eating, maybe in concept, but not actually doing it. Are you full, then? Or are you still stomach-empty?
Reading a book is the only way of reading a book. It is through reading that you not only understand the story and its themes, which guides like SparkNotes help us do, but also understand the book, the author, the characters, the feel of pages, the emotions, the judgements, the boredoms, and so on. It is only through reading a book that you get to experience the book – and books are primarily meant to be experienced, not studied.
Having read a total of six, seven chapters, I haven’t read this book, but I have finished it. So, therefore, my review is most parts confession, navel-gazing, and consolidating my guilty conscious, and few parts talking about the story of this book, but not a deserved review of it, per se. Now that I recall the beginning of this novel, I remember that I had started it before as well, but had quickly decided not to continue. Since the start of this novel is so important to the story, and also so picturesque in hindsight, it is hard not to remember it – and once finishing the book, hard not to see its importance through and through.
Pip, the nick-named protagonist, is an orphaned child who lives with his only surviving family, the elder sister Mrs. Joe. There are taken in my Joe, the kind blacksmith, after Pip’s brother-in-law dies. Pip is at the church graveyard when the novel opens, and there he encounters a fleeing convict who orders Pip to bring him food the next morning. I’ll take a sharp turn here, as Pip after that brief encounter, is sent to Miss Havisham’s house after being summoned there. A cold, bitter, and dominating lady, Miss Havisham also has a stepdaughter, Estella, who is beautiful but desperately like her stepmom. Pip grows a liking for Estella, despite being treated harshly for his ‘lower class and illiteracy’.
Ambitions of becoming a gentleman and moving to a higher class, fired by his love for Estella, takes Pip on his journey of great expectations – a journey that is masterfully woven together by Dickens – which ends on the noblest and most reassuring of lessons in life.
I once again failed to like Dicken’s prose, but I fell in quite a love with his storytelling. This is, by all means measurable, a very thrilling, beautiful, insightful, challenging, and poignant novel – worthy of being claimed one of the classics’ best. Both the structure of the novel – three volumes, each ending on the repeating theme of great expectations and its perils – and also the bridging of two distinct storylines into one towards the end of the novel, are both brilliantly done.
The first-person narrative also helps Pip not only tell his story, but also judge himself as he narrates – again, brilliant! The strict morality and sense-of justice in this novel is also quite commendable. Rarely seen in novels, Dicken’s confidence in his sense of judgements for his character, alongside his ability to unravel the complications of conflicting traits and how it affects the character, is something assuring for the reader. The judgments, in the Dicken’s world, are called right here on earth – and it is powerful yet also tendering.
Reading chapter by chapter, and not page by page, I was quite sad
and full of guilt at reading the plot-points being revealed while me not
reading the book, but a short description of it. I am sure I must have missed a
lot of the book by reading the guide and not the book, but at least, I’m happy
to have acquainted myself with this worthy story. For now, the dilemma
continues – for the final verdict is not due in a lot of time. Meanwhile, the
best I can do, is honesty, which I’ve tried my best to do here.
Ratings: 4/5 **** July 29, 2022_