重读旧书：基于内疚的快感？_BEC初级作文

重读旧书：基于内疚的快感？

For children, it’s a comfort. As we become accustomed to a world in which change is the only real constant, the familiarity of the book at bedtime is something to cling to. Adults aren’t immune to those feelings, either. To quote the septuagenarian writer Larry McMurtry: “If I once read for adventure, I now read for security. How nice to be able to return to what won’t change.”

Except that often, that’s not quite the case. We notice fresh details. Our interpretations change as we evolve – cheerleading for the strivers, for instance, gives way to admiration for characters who are slow and steady.

Vladimir Nabokov had a theory about this. He believed that the process of moving our eyes from left to right, line after line, page after page, stood between us and artistic interpretation the first time round. By the fourth reading, the experience has apparently assumed more of the directness of looking at a painting. “One cannot read a book: one can only re-read it,” he said.

Scientists have weighed in, too, citing the mental health benefits of re-reading. Research conducted with readers in the US and New Zealand found that on our first reading, we are preoccupied by the ‘what?’ and the ‘why?’. Second time round, we’re able to better savour the emotions that the plot continues to ignite. As researcher Cristel Russell of the American University explained of re-readers in an article published in the Journal of Consumer Research, returning to a book “brings new or renewed appreciation of both the object of consumption and their self”.