I put so much pressure on myself to hit that 52 book target, and finishing Swann's Way was a very big part of that reading goal. I'm not under any illusion that reading Proust will make me a better person or that reading 52 books in a year gives me some claim to superiority, but I want to be the kind of person who reads Proust and many different kinds of books. I enjoyed Swann's Way. It's a brilliant novel. It's just not always fun reading. When it comes right down to it, I read because I think it's fun. I've wound my identity into reading in all kinds of weird and unnecessary ways, but I keep going back to reading because it's something that I enjoy. I felt obligated to read a certain kind of book as the end of my reading year got closer. I had to figure a book's impact on reaching my reading goal when making my decision of what to read next. That limitation obligated me to fairly small subset of my books. I couldn't read anything too thick or too intimidating. The goal propelled me to new levels of reading consumption, but it prevented me from exploring different authors and types of books. It definitely took away from the fun of reading.
The pleasure I'm taking in being free of a reading obligation has me questioning the value of pre-selecting a batch of books for 2017. I've done this the last couple of years and have made abysmal progress on reading that particular set of books. I set aside 17 books as things I wanted to read in 2016. I read 6 of them. Out of 52 books, I read 6 of the books I thought would be interesting reading. I read more of the books that I bough last year, 8 of my 52 books read in 2016 were bought in 2016, than I read of those 17 books that I gave special status too at the beginning of the year. To give myself a small break on falling short of this goal, some of those books (War and Peace, The Good Soldier) were largely challenging books that I aspire to read one day. I read other books that fall into that list (Anna Karenina, Swann's Way). So when I look at those 17 books as representing the types of books that I wanted to read, I actually did a pretty nice job. I had To the Lighthouse in last year's list as a representative of the Modern Library Top 100. I read far more of those titles than I thought I would at the start of the year. I read 9 of them in 2016. That brings me up to 41 of the 100. I still need to read To the Lighthouse though.
When it comes down to it, I just want to read the books that are on my shelf. It was hard for me to pick which book to read because there were so many of them that sounded appealing. This is a good problem. Cutting myself off from buying new books has given me a chance to stop and take another look at my own shelves. I'm not looking out in the big wide world for the next thing to read, but taking a closer look at what I already have. I spent a good chunk of 2016 clearing out a bunch of hastily acquired mediocre books from my reading shelves. While I failed to made a serious dent in my owned but unread books (thanks to my buying compulsion), I did remove a bunch of bothersome distractions from my pursuit of larger reading goals. I bought a bunch of books this year, but I avoided buying too many books on a whim. A biography on Grant was the only book I would unbuy if I had the option. The others are books that I've wanted to read for awhile. They're by authors I've read and enjoyed or books I've been curious about for awhile.
I will have no problems finding 30 books that I want to read this year on my shelves. At least I hope to read 30 this year. I've set 30 as my Goodreads reading challenge target. It's ambitious enough that I will have to stay consistent with my reading to reach that goal, but it's also not so ambitious that will have to consider the heft of every book that I read to make sure I won't fall off my reading pace too much if I decide to read something that approaches 1000 pages in length. I enjoy the process of reading a book, but I also get a real kick out of finishing a book. Having an annual reading goal makes me feel like I'm making progress towards something. That sense of progress is particularly relevant as I pursue Book Shelf Zero. Thirty isn't a small reading goal, I will need to finish a book every 12 days or so to stay on track for that goal, but it's still only 1/6th of my book total. All these books are like big credit card balances. I read and read but the total just doesn't seem to get any smaller.
So I really have three concurrent reading goals. The first is to read 30 books in 2017. I've done at least that many over the last four years. My willingness to take on intimidating books will be the decider on this one. The second goal is to read all of the Modern Library Top 100 books. I've read 41 one of them and I already own 19 more. I can make good progress on that goal without setting myself back too far towards Book Shelf Zero. Book Shelf Zero is the third goal. It's going to take me years to realize that one. I would be impressed if I manage it in 10 years. It's not that I'll need 10 years to read 180 books. I will buy more books, I will struggle to finish what I have, and face all kinds of other stuff in my life. There are many things in life more important than reading, but reading will always be there.
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