A New Perspective / The Common Reader by Virginia Woolf

I've been part of the classics book blogging community for many years now. More often than not I have been a quiet observer soaking up words others have written and occassionally adding my own insights. I've never suffered from a lack of confidence but writing about texts from hundreds of years ago can be intimidating and daunting at times. I love classic literature, I couldn't imagine not reading classic literature, but sometimes I catch myself reading more critical analysis' of books or reviews or books than the actual books themselves. Why? I'm not sure. It's a mix of intellectual curiosity and self doubt when it comes to critically analysing texts myself. I find myself thinking about how hundreds and thousands of academics and writers and critics have said everything there is to say about the literature I naturally find myself drawn to. I compare my thoughts to others. I feel like I should read THIS because someone else thinks everyone should read it or I avoid THIS because not many people have discussed it and my brain starts to wonder if it's valuable. I've always been aware of time or the lack thereof. For someone who is so aware of time I definitely do waste a lot of it thinking about what I should be doing instead of doing it.

In times where I have found myself in reading ruts, more often than not over the past few years, I have never stopped being a reader. I'm reading journal articles about books I've read or writers I admire. I'm reading posts written by my fellow classics lovers. I'm reading poetry even if its only a line or two here and a line or two there. I'm reading short stories. I'm reading articles about history. Yet I dismiss that as not reading. It is reading. I love knowledge. I will get it any way I can. I will share the knowledge I have found with anyone who will listen. Yet when it comes to the books I love I feel a block when it comes to writing about them or expressing my thoughts. Which brings me to the point of this post...

I was reading bits and pieces from Virginia Woolf's Common Reader series the other day (I have it bookmarked because I like to read her essays on Russian literature and others every now and then) and I came across the first "mini essay" in the collection called, well, "The Common Reader" and it caught my attention immeadiately. In this piece she refers to Dr Johnson's Life of Gray (which I will put at the bottom of this post because it's not very long) and talks about the Common Reader. Virginia Woolf outlines how the Common Reader is someone who reads for pleasure and not to impart wisdom on others. She talks about how the Common reader is someone who is guided by a sort of inner feeling to sketch some kind of portrait of a person or a concept from the work they read. The Common reader may not be an academic or contribute new great ideas to criticism but that doesn't mean the Common reader's thoughts are any less valid. Virginia Woolf finishes with the statement that with all of the above noted it may be worthwhile to note down thoughts about literature, however insignificant. It is what she did in her book of essays and it's what I am going to vow to do on this blog.

I have spent the last week restructuring both my attitude towards talking about the texts I read and restructuring my blog. I've taken a knife to my old Classics Club list and have created a brand new one which I will talk about in a different post. The new one is full of books I am anticipating and I have cut out the titles that I was dreading because life is too short. My time is too valuable.

So, with all of that said, I vow to read and write and hopefully I can find some way to illuminate my thoughts in a way that inspires others to read the work I love.

And as promised here is the short passage from "The Common Reader" that inspired this post:

“ . . . I rejoice to concur with the common reader; for by the common sense of readers, uncorrupted by literary prejudices, after all the refinements of subtilty and the dogmatism of learning, must be finally decided all claim to poetical honours.”