I have been reading “The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction” which is a collection of essays, speeches, introductions and articles written by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman is a prolific author of horror novels, short stories, graphic novels and fantasy books. The book was on the “librarian recommended” shelf at the library. Since I had heard of Gaiman and enjoy reading nonfiction essays, I picked it up.
The first section is speeches he gave to at writers conferences, library fundraisers, literacy organizations, and awards ceremonies. He talks about his love for reading as a child. He tells stories of traveling to second hand bookstores is England as a young boy to buy discounted fiction novels with his meager savings. He discusses at length reading through all of the children fiction in his local library before moving into adult fiction and discovering the wonderful world of Science Fiction. He calls out specific bookshop owners, librarians and clerks who shared his love for reading. These supporters recommended new authors, taught him to use interlibrary loans, and discussed books with him.
Just reading his stories reminds me of my own childhood. I loved books even before I could read. I would sit on my Aunt Essie’s lap and she would read Grimm’s Fairy Tales to me – doing deep, scary voices for the wolves and ogres, high pitched voices for the princesses and children, and sound effects for the “action scenes”.
I couldn’t wait to learn how to read myself. And I did – when I was 4 in preschool. I had a fantastic teacher and lots of encouragement from her, my Aunt Es and my Grandmother. I would sit in Essie’s kitchen and read the very same fairy tale books she once read to me!
It got better from there. I got my first library card around age 5. My mom or Aunt Essie would take me to the library where I could borrow up to 3 books from the children’s section! I read anything I could get my hands on but was especially fascinated with books about dinosaurs at the time.
My 4 room elementary school didn’t have a “library”. It was so small that it had 4 classrooms – one for each grade (1st through 4th). Each teacher maintained a shelf of “grade level appropriate books” that kids could read in class and borrow to take home. Because I was an advanced reader, I got to visit all four classrooms on library day to select any books.
In 3rd grade, we moved to Pittsburgh. It was one of the most traumatic events of my life. I was no longer surrounded by everyone and everything I knew and loved. Overnight, we were torn away from a familiar, predictable life surrounded by 4 generations of family. Three days later, I started 3rd grade in a strict Catholic school, with harsh nuns as teachers, unfamiliar kids as classmates, people who talked with Pittsburghese accents and no fun whatsoever.
I went from loving school to hating it and wishing I was dead. (Not literally. I wished I was back home in Tamaqua where I belonged).
I found solace at the local Swissvale library, which was 2 blocks away from my home. I first visited there to use their World Book and Britannica Encyclopedias for homework. The librarians taught me how to use the card catalog to find other reference books too. As I wandered around the stacks, I discovered the “older than babies” kid’s book section. It was a small corner with 3 sets of shelves. I’d guess it held about 150 books. I read all of them over the next two years.
Early on, after I had devoured my allotment of 3 books over the weekend, I returned them the following Monday. The librarian looks at me suspiciously and said, “There’s no way you read these books already.” I protested that I had read them and proceeded to tell her about each of them, what I liked and what I didn’t. Her furrowed brow and frown shifted into a smile of surprise. Over the next two years, she took me under her wing and helped me choose books from the adult book section where I read about cowboys, Indians, soldiers, generals and, of course, science fiction.
Reading fiction books enabled me to escape from my scary, chaotic life into a world of heroism, inspiration, order and peace. I dove headfirst into that world for the rest of my childhood.
Reading for pleasure dropped off when I was in college. My days were so jam packed and my workload so heavy that I had no time to read anything other than my assigned work (plus newspapers, bus signs, billboards, cereal boxes, magazines, bulletin board postings, etc.).
During semester breaks, I would visit the city library and check out 10 books at a time which I could escape into each week. I read murder mysteries, westerns, detective books and of course, sci-fi. I was drawn to characters who were independent, loner men who were fearless, intelligent, capable and autonomous. I fantasized that someday I could move to Boston or Florida and be courageous and independent too.
I stopped reading fiction in my mid-30s. As a husband, a workaholic and a hustler who was scrambling to get ahead financially without a college degree (or a clue), I dedicated my little free time to reading books about business, technology and leadership. I read every sales book/success/self help book I could find – from Dale Carnegie to Zig Ziglar to Nathanial Hale to Tony Robbins to Steven Covey and too many others to recall. Some of it was great. Much of it was bullshit. I learned from all of it.
Now that I am 5 years removed from the business world, I am rediscovering my love for reading. At first, I could barely get through any fiction books. The plots were predictable, the stories lame and the experience boring. So instead, over the past 2 years, I’ve read hundreds of nonfictions books – essays, memoirs, sociology books, history, psychology and current events.
But every once in a while I stumble across a fiction book that is irresistible. Something by Max Brooks. Or the book, Tyll. Or a historical fiction novel. Or one I never read from one of my old favorite authors like Crais, Robert B. Parker, or John D MacDonald. When I get consumed by one of these I almost cannot pu the book down until I finish it.
And now, Neil Gaiman has reminded about how much I used to love Science Fiction. My next visit to the library, I’m diving back into that world.