One thing I’ve really enjoyed doing lately is finding articles and lectures and video essays about the book I’m reading. Reading itself is fun — it’s why why read, after all — but I’ve really missed out on how much fun it is to listen to others gush and rant about what you’re reading, too.
If all you do is read the book, you actually miss out on a lot of stuff.
Take Dante’s Inferno. I’ve been reading it here and there this spring, and about one-third of the way through, I thought: _Is this it? Is this entire book going to be a weird, imaginative romp through hell? What’s the big deal?
Instead of putting the book down or speed-reading my way through it, I stopped and searched the internet: Why do people even like Dante’s Inferno so much?
Thus began my own descent into hell YouTube, where I watched a college professor lecture about why he thinks Dante’s Inferno is the most important book in the world. It was interesting, so next I watched a booktuber gush about the brutal imagery in the book. Then I remembered someone say Hozier’s “Unreal Unearth” album had references to Dante’s Inferno, so I found a Tumblr post with a big list of them.
In a strange twist, wondering about why I found “Inferno” uninteresting led me down a path that made it much more interesting.
Maybe we just get more curious about something when we hear others get excited about it. Like enthusiasm is just contagious, and other people’s love for “Inferno” transferred over to me.
But I think something bigger is going on. Thinking more about what you like or dislike like about a book, then listening to other people have to say about what they liked and disliked is way more fun than just reading a book and moving on to the next.
If you poke around, you can find TONS of content for whatever book you’re reading — from professional criticism to rambling reviewers to tiny little posts with one thought.
My overall idea of “Inferno” hasn’t changed — I still think it’s a weird romp through hell! But I’ve been enjoying it much more after watching, reading, and listening to a bunch of secondary content, too.