But for whatever reason, I was touched by Dana Gioia's essay in a recent issue of Stanford magazine. It's about his childhood as a reader - definitely going against the grain in his immigrant, working-class community. And the way that reading opened new vistas. I had already learned that Gioia is a reader by compulsion, but was nonetheless moved by his phraseology:
every true reader has a secret life, which is equally intense, complex and important. The books we read are no different from the people we meet or the cities we visit. Some books, people or places hardly matter, others change our lives, and still others plant some idea or sentiment that influences our futures. No one else will ever read, reread or misread the same books in the same way or in the same order. Our inner lives are as rich and real as our outer lives, even if they remain mostly unknowable to others. Perhaps that is why books matter so much. They serve as our intimate companions. Some books guide us. Others lead us astray. A few rescue or redeem us. All of them confide something of the wonder, joy, terror and mystery of being alive.
I've argued with others whether it's better to observe or do. I usually end up feeling like I'm losing out by liking to read my adventures rather than live them. But Gioia argues that the lives we read are our own and intensely real as well, something I've felt intuitively but not heard often enough from others. So despite the fact that he is part of the Administration as head of the National Endowment for the Arts, he gets a little star from Erin's Library.
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