The Importance of Having a Reading List

I want to talk about the importance of having a yearly reading list, especially if you are a writer.

I was first introduced to the idea of "intentional reading" from an article in Poets and Writers several years ago (forgive me but I can't remember the name of the article's author). He suggested not only intentional reading but an actual syllabus to ensure that the unfocused writer did not fall into the trap of reading the same author or just reading whatever fell in his/her lap.

It's crucial for a writer (especially) to continue to read difficult, varied, and classic books because this is our job. There are books on my list that I've been "meaning" to read for years, like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Would I have done it without the curriculum? Maybe not.

Most people either balk at my supposed abundance of time or share my enthusiasm but won't actually commit. I understand--I kept that photocopied article from P & W for years in a desk drawer for years. This year, making my list of New Year's resolutions, I could feel the resistance and the excuses: I'm not a fast reader. I'm the mother of two children, one only seven months old--I'm not even operating on full nights of sleep. I have my own editing business and I'm finishing my second novel. It's too daunting...

The truth is, once I made the list all my fears evaporated.

1 biography: Chief Joseph and the Flight of the Nez Pierce (Kent Nurburn)

1 memoir: Speak, Memory (Vladimir Nabokov)

3 classics: Altas Shrugged (Any Rand), Brave New World (Aldous Huxley), Tropic of Cancer (Henry Miller)

2-3 writing books: The Writing Life (Annie Dillard), Elements of Style (Struck and White), Bird by Bird (Anne Lamott)

1 history book: A People's History of the U.S. (Howard Zinn)

2-3 books by authors I've never read: Ishmael (Daniel Quinn), In Cold Blood (Truman Capote), The End of the Affair (Graham Greene)

1 book poetry: Ariel (Sylvia Plath)

1 unread book by a fave author: A Moveable Feast (Ernest Hemingway)

2-3 books in a new discipline or field: In the Shadow of Man (Jane Goodall), The Soul of Money (Lynn Twist), Elements of Typographic Style (Robert Bringhurst)

1 children’s book: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Mark Twain)

2-3 rereads--any genre: The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (Tom Wolfe), On the Road (Jack Kerouac), The Incredible Lightness of Being (Milan Kundera)

1 international/intercultural: The God of Small Things (Arundhati Roy)

1 other: Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting (Jon and Myla Kabat-Zinn)