Overwhelmed!

[MrRegular]

I know that you've experienced it. The curiously pleasant frustration that comes from browsing a Barnes&Noble. That feeling that there just aren't enough hours in a lifetime to read everything that you would like to. And then there's the nostalgia factor, pulling you back to those books you've read before.
Personally It all makes me want to pitch a tent over one of those couches with a lifetime supply of expresso and get to work.
It's like that twilight zone episode where the bookish guy survives the apocalypse and find a library; "finally, there's enough time" (luckily I don't wear glasses).

What I'm asking is: how do you cope with it? If you start a book that seems to be wasting your time, do you drop it and continue your browsing? Or are you a militant completionist ("I've started it and I'm going to finish it, I don't care it he does devote a whole chapter to the whiteness of the whale"). Do you plan your reading material in advance?

Just wondering...

[kiki1982]

About planning:

I pick something up in the shop and put it on the 'to read' pile. It now counts about 5 books. Then, when I have finished one, I look at what I fancy, or sometimes I have decided before I finish my current read. It depends, really. Sometimes I get so enthusiastic that I can't wait for finishing the other one to finish. I try to change eras unless I'm in a mood but not most of the time. Otherwise it's all the same.

About reading and finishing:

Mostly I do not have a hard time. I have discovered that one needs to read the things he feels like reading, because otherwise one tends to leave them after a while. 'What you are ready for,' some people might say. I rarely read two books at the same time, although I have done so on rare occasions. Notably the ones where I was over-excited about the next book. However, plays, poems, short stories (both senses), I do read apart when I want to read them. Not whole books though.

Putting something down? It should be very very very very very boring. I had a hard time with The Mill on the Floss, but eventually I got into it and I might be reading Middlemarch at a later date. I am an 'I will finish it'-person for the simple fact that when I have put something down once, I tend to never read it again, or I might try and fail every time. And I don't want that. Can't bear the sight of it on my book shelf.

But haven't we had this topic before?

[LitNetIsGreat]

Yes, it is a fair point that I’m sure most people have felt at one time or another, but we have to come to terms with the fact that we can only ever scratch the surface of what is on offer in our lifetime. Once we have done this, then we can begin to just appreciate and enjoy what we can, even if occasionally we feel a little annoyed that we are not immortal.

Personally, what frustrates me quite a lot is the shadow of what I “have to read” in terms of my studies, it nearly always hangs over me. No matter what how much effort I might have put in on a particular topic I feel that I can/should, always be doing more and often feel guilty whenever I read for personal interest, wherever my fancy takes me. I used to really love reading on a whim without having to think about what I really “should” be doing, it’s actually the only serious way to read when you think about it, though I hope to get back to that feeling relatively soon.

[dfloyd]

becomes. You start to realize that you're just not going to be able to read all you want in your remaining days. To cut down on my reading quantity, I have used such dramatizations as those on Masterpiece Theatre to more rapidly absorb a story line and the characterization. For example, I, Claudius in about 9 episodes knocks out two of Robert Graves' novels. Bleak House takes care of a very long Dickens novel. I knocked out The Mill on the Floss and Middlemarch in one week. I'm not suggesting that just any commercial movie can take the place of reading, but the Masterpiece Theatre productions follow the story line and they don't invent characters as does Hollywood. Fortunately, my local library has most of the MP dramatizations on dvd.

Modern and post-modern novels are relegated to listening to unabridged cds. These are the ones I terminate if I find they are wasting my time. Of the many, many classics I have read, I've only given up on one author: Virginia Woolf. I've gotten through unabridged copies od Les Miserables and War and Peace, but I find Ms Woolf more than I can take, whether she ever gets to the Light House or not.