Words don´t matter?

I have read a book I struggled with and this lead me to think that I don´t always see the point in spending time with words I just want to get on with my book. So this video is me talking about my issues with complex sentences etc.
Do you have tips on how to better understand text?
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Thank you for watching!

[@OhioEddieBlack]

As far as reading comprehension goes, based on my 20 years teaching reading/English/grammar, I have personally seen proof over and over again that the more you read, the better your reading comprehension becomes. A study done in the US showed that reading just 20 minutes a day exposes you to almost 2 million words a year, and of course the exposure (and repeated re-exposure to those words, including those you didn't know prior to reading that book) makes your overall reading comprehension ability skyrocket until you eventually plateau at whatever your maximum ability is. Having said that, there are always going to be authors and books which are overall just difficult, even for someone like you who is well read. Some authors even deliberately set out to write a particularly esoteric or erudite work in order to set themselves apart in a way that generally has the opposite effect they were hoping for. Don't look at it like a negative reflection on your cognitive abilities but rather look at a particularly difficult book as an exception to the norm. Also, don't ever compare your comprehension experience with what other people have said about the book. A lot of people who post on social media about books like this are either spouting off stuff they heard OTHER people say in their university class, or they've lifted quotes picked from a scholarly review of the work, because they, unlike you, are afraid to say "I didn't get this." The fact that you are willing to sit in front of the camera and say "this was not very accessible to me" makes your viewers respect you more, not less, and makes you as a content creator more relatable to the average person. Some books are just not broadly accessible - not the average reader's fault. Or even the above-average reader's fault, haha.

[@becomingabookworm]

Well this was at least encouraging reading! I do notice that my ability to interpret words I already know have gotten "better" or I am more aware of the usage of words if that makes sense. Maybe ill revisit this topic in some years to see if things have become different. Why some authors would write in a more difficult way to be perceived as complex I will never understand but they sure are out there. Also, I should retrain my ability to DNF..

[@MattMilu]

Life’s too short to stress over reading books that are written poorly or too complicated! Stay clear of those or DNF! 😊

[@becomingabookworm]

You are right. I´ll try to do so next time..

[@Hyperboreasy]

(I appreciate literature is a different artform, but) I think it helps to face this the way we face music. We all hear a song differently, and even if we know what the song is about, sometimes it doesn't click for us - or clicks in a way other people don't relate to. It shouldn't be a matter of intelligence, just of perception. Some books are on a different "frequency" to what we can register, or we are not in the right mood (headspace) for them.

[@becomingabookworm]

I thought about this comparison and I guess for me the difference is that music is about feelings and emotions whereas books are supposed to tell me something in additon to making me feel stuff. I guess I am also the kind of person that listens more to melodies rather than lyrics.. Reading your comment makes me yet again wonder if I am overcomplicating stuff again. Wish I could try on someone elses reading brain sometime!

[@OhioEddieBlack]

Very interesting to hear you say it's easier to talk about a book you don't like. I agree because it's a well known fact at the library book club I attend that our group has way more to say about books we don't like. When we do like a book, the conversation is typically much shorter, and we end up spending more time talking about other stuff we are reading. This is also true of the book club I host at my house. So I guess it makes sense that doing an individual book review would follow the same pattern. I have not read that book, but based just on the cover, it totally looks like it should be the next book in the Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children series 😄

[@becomingabookworm]

I think this also relates to things in general. It is kind of fun talking about stuff one does not like.. Had to google the books.. The title seemed a bit more jolly than the covers haha.. This is a ww2 themed novel so in some way it could maybe fit in that series somehow.

[@OhioEddieBlack]

@@becomingabookworm People in retail say the same thing about customer experience. If a customer stops at the store and everything is fine, they don't mention it, but if there is a problem, they tell everyone they talk to that day that the store sucks and why. Our species does enjoy complaining 🙄

[@becomingabookworm]

Indeed.. it’s not pretty.

[@lessidisa]

I just read quotes from this book and it does look like a hassle to get through ... congrats for the achievement of reading it 🤗 I don't have any advice to give you so see you in the next video 🤣 thanks for doing 10 minutes long videos, instead of 20-40 minutes ... really nice 👍

[@becomingabookworm]

Im just glad you left a comment! I don´t think I have it in me to make long videos, so I guess I will stay this way for a while :)

[@talking_to_trees]

I think everyone appreciates different aspects of reading, and I also think it matters how long you've been a reader and how much you enjoy it (vs having had to work at it). I personally LOVE language! I love puns and wit and wordplay and poetry and beautiful descriptions and run on sentences. I love Shakespeare and Terry Pratchett and Pat Conroy for that reason. I had a brilliant English teacher in High School, but also started reading when I was 5 and in 2 languages. And while I enjoy a good plot and a fun story, the books that really grab me are the ones that try to find language large enough to say all the things we struggle to find words for. Having said that, sometimes a book is just not for me. Sometimes the translation is a bit flat. It happens. Not every book is meant for every reader, no matter how wonderfully it might be for another. You can take some English lit classes but there are some great videos on KZbin as well, BUT only you can decide whether that would mean something to you and be worth the effort. Loving language came easy to me, and I know it can be learned/valued if a person desired to, but not every passion is worthwhile for every person.

[@becomingabookworm]

I think you´re hitting the nail on it´s head. My theory is also that people that read a lot as they were kids develope a better understand for language and thus they enjoy it more as they grow older. But this is just my theory.

[@talking_to_trees]

@@becomingabookworm I think I agree with your theory. Most readers that I know that came to reading later (usually teens and after), tend to love the stories. Which does make me wonder whether that is not the main reason early readers start reading early: not so much because they have a love for stories, but because they have a love of language and perhaps even a natural affinity for it. I am also a polyglot and a total grammar nerd. Anyway, stories are a part of our humanness, and it doesn't always need language play or even exact language to be great or even happen.

[@Unpotted]

It isn’t just you. 😃 There are too many books available to us to waste time reading something we don’t like. DNF like your life depends on it because your sanity is more important. If you really want to read it, you can always come back to it later. Thanks for your review. 😺✌️

[@becomingabookworm]

It’s a long time since I have read something I perceived as challenging as this, so I am calling this one an exception.. In general I am getting better at putting books I don’t like down.. And as you remind me now, the book does not disappear if I put it down for a while.. Thanks for your comment!

[@dianesellepedrosa1876]

You can do a buddy read and discuss the hard bits.

[@becomingabookworm]

That´s a good idea. Even now that I am finished I´ll go and seek advice from friends I know have read this one.

[@tracy9000]

I usually just keep reading if I am overall enjoying the book. I'm sure plenty of things go over my head or sometimes I am not at all interested in portions of a book, and that's ok. The books I DNF are usually poorly written or the content is not what I expected.

[@becomingabookworm]

In general I don´t DNF enough books.. I think the threshold is even higher for books I don´t understand vs the ones I just don´t like. This book in particular is a good example of this. Next time i´ll DNF! (I hope..)

[@Curious-Cat]

This might be basic advice, so just ignore it if it feels too obvious: keep reading challenging books -- practice will surely help, try to up the difficulty progressively so that you don't feel completely out of your depths, and look for external resources that might give you additional context on the book (especially when there is a lot of intertextuality) or what other people said about it. Overall, I wonder if there isn't also a big factor of taste and timing. I think it's perfectly fine and valid as a reader not to care so much about the language -- books are rich enough for people to look for different things in them. So if you feel that kind of book with flowery prose isn't your thing, that's totally ok. As for timing, I feel like the mood we're in, our level of mental energy, and at a more high level, where we are in life, etc. do impact a lot our experience of reading. There are just times when we won't be able to appreciate a book. Maybe it wasn't the right time for you to read this book (I haven't read it, so I don't have any thoughts about its quality). Sometimes, we rediscover books later on and what escaped us then suddenly becomes apparent. Sometimes, it's just not the book for us. As a final point, there is also sometimes a kind of peer pressure to like a book, because it's a classic, or acclaimed by many people... That has definitely made me feel like a "bad reader" in the past, when I did not like at all some books that everyone seemed to declare were masterpieces (hum-Frankenstein-hum). It helped to read reviews by other people who also didn't like them (I'm not alone!), and think about whether it is a taste thing or a timing thing. Some books, I think I was probably too young/immature to appreciate and might have a different experience with them now (or later). Others, I do have clear reasons why I really did not enjoy them, and even hearing other people's argument about why they're supposedly great books doesn't change my mind, which makes me think that it's definitely a taste thing in this case. That was a very long and rambly comment, but hopefully, you find something interesting or helpful somewhere in there ^^' Thanks for making this thought-provoking video, I at least enjoyed thinking about this topic :D

[@becomingabookworm]

I don´t know if it´s obvious or not. I have not felt it helping reading challenging books earlier, but I do thing the issue here is defining what I feel is a challenging novel and how it affects me. Your comment made me think of all the books I felt were a challenge getting through and that I still remember today with joy but when reading them I just found them exhausting to read. There might absolutely be something there.. :) And timing is also crucial. I have read books at one point that I feel I would have valued a whole lot more had I read them at a better time and also there are books I have put down because I felt they were difficult but then picked back up a couple of days later and they were "readable" again. Also agree on that last point. It always cheers me up to talk about a book I disliked with someone else that had the same feeling. Maybe not the most constructive activity, but it helps! Thanks for this wonderful comment!

[@reaganwiles_art]

I only read a book if it calls to me, I must be drawn to it somehow, often this is mysterious. Whether the book is The Little Prince or Hands, Hands, Fingers, Thumb or Ulysses or Cujo or The Trial or War and Peace or Lolita or Satan in Goray or Twilight or The Dragon Doesnt Live Here Anymore has no significance except to me, or shouldn't. Why should I care what you read unless you ask for recommendations? Of course I also make unsolicited recommendations to folks; whether they read them is for them to decide. When I've greatly enjoyed something I want others who may enjoy it too to do so-if they wish. Sometimes I want to dig myself out of a mire, it helps if the mud scintillates. And sometimes the most impenetrable jungle opens into a clearing and everything becomes translucent, the scales fall from my eyes. Those are my favorite, when my illusions are craftily constructed for me and equally well made to vanish, the floor falls out from under one. Ubik is one such book for me.r

[@becomingabookworm]

Someone commented earlier on this video saying that people are on different frequencies when it comes to what books they like or resonate with. I liked that way of looking at it. I also like how you describe how the books you like make you feel! My reading will forever be decided by coincidences along the way but also with more and more help from my experience with books earlier. I do like that journey!

[@jakeschell3941]

Well some people like chocolate and some don’t. Doesn’t change the chocolate at all. Every text is not enjoyable for everyone either.

[@becomingabookworm]

That´s well put! I guess I just wished I knew more about why some people like chocolate in this case, but I am expecting that I will find some of those answers soon enough.

[@jakeschell3941]

@@becomingabookworm I’m not sure either why some do and some don’t. Probably no really good answers for the question but it is fun to ponder.

[@dianesellepedrosa1876]

I went through this in The Unseen by Roy Jacobsen. A very important situation happened and I didn’t understand how it happened even though it was mentioned a few times through the series. I googled and answer but to no avail. 😢

[@becomingabookworm]

That´s not a great feeling.. My girlfriend has started reading Jacobsen now so it´s only a matter of time before I start as well!

[@BookishTexan]

I think you should read what you want and stop reading books that make you feel bad about yourself. Sebald was intentionally indirect in his story telling. It isn’t for everyone and if it isn’t for you that doesn’t mean that there’s anything wrong with you or your reading ability. He might not be an author that works for you and there is nothing wrong with that.

[@becomingabookworm]

You are absolutely right. I do believe I have two problems. The first on is that it’s still a challenge to choose the books that fit me and my reading. The second is to know when to quit. Halfway through this read I was still able to persuade myself that it would turn around at some point. Luckily I do believe I am on the right track since these kinds of reads are happening more seldomly than they used to.

[@TXVETJEB]

The sentences didn' t make sense, but someone still thought it should be published. There's a lot of subpar crap out there these days. Self and traditional published.

[@becomingabookworm]

That is absolutely true. I have those thoughts each time I try to find a new book for my kindle..