Reading through
Philip K. Dick's speech How To Build A Universe
That Doesn't Fall Apart in Two Days (Dick, 1978) back in September I
realised that I had read it before. Not recently, as I know that I read
portions of it as referenced in N. Katherine Hayles' How We Became Posthuman (Hayles, 1999) (or even more recently
just before in excerpts detailed on Maria Popova's blog (Popova, 2013)), or as
detailed in the Imaginary Worlds podcast
episode on the subject of Dick's exegesis (Molinsky, 2018)1, but deeper in the
past. In some forgotten corner I had sought this out by Dick and had consumed
it, letting it lay dormant in my mind. It occurred to me to ask myself whether in some private thoughts I may have merely recapitulated ideas I had read from Dick, having forgotten the
attribution, and mistaken them for my own? This process, known as cryptomnesia,
whereby one experiences a memory but mistakes it for something genuinely
original or inspired, pressed especially on my mind because of Dick's own
accounting of his experiences, experiences that led him to some bizarre
beliefs.
On Reading More and Reading Better
Throughout 2017 and
continuing through 2018 I have attempted to drastically increase the quantity
of reading that I do. For both years I have kept in mind a general goal of
completing 52 books in one year - one book per week. This is a common challenge
as any Internet search will quickly reveal. The reasons for wanting to
undertake such a challenge are numerous: as a means to expand one's vocabulary,
improve one's writing through familiarization of different styles and
techniques, to increase one's knowledge and understanding, and as a way of
improving organization and scheduling skills. That last one is important;
despite the vast amount of time that is doubtless consumed in reading this
much, the argument is generally made that it can be safely taken away from all
the time that we generally waste in a day: the idle Internet browsing, the
Netflix binge-watching, playing games or fiddling with apps. While I believe
I've benefited from significantly expanding my reading, I have mixed feelings
about the project.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)