I’m that crazy person who always has a book on hand, who never has enough bookshelves, who knows how to read while walking and not get hit by a bus. If you are not also this brand of crazy, you might be asking yourself… why?

Like most people, I like to blame the way I am on my parents. After all, they were the ones who decided not to have a TV while I was growing up. Of course, I know other people who didn’t have TV’s, and they don’t carry around books like a security blanket. Maybe it’s because books played a role in my life before I could read them myself. My mother introduced me to C.S. Lewis and Laura Ingalls Wilder by reading them to me at bedtime, and I remember being that little tyke pretending to read from an upside down book to even younger tykes. Except for Winnie-the-Pooh, which I would quote from memory.

So maybe it’s a combination of things. Not having a TV meant I spent my quiet time doing other things, and having parents who value reading made books easily accessible. Growing up in small town Maine meant that there were only a few places to spend time, and one of these was the Library. The Jesup Memorial Library is small by some standards, but just right for the needs of a summer town. The architecture is grand enough to reflect some importance, and to feel special, but the children’s room is sunny and warm, and the librarians friendly.

Libraries taught me the freedom of reading, and the wealth of knowledge readily available to anyone who looks. Stories take you away, allowing you to travel in time and space, even if you don’t have access to a TARDIS. My first philosophical ideas came to me as a result of reading fantasy, my first forays into our past as a result of reading historical fiction.

I often turn to books out of curiosity, but I have to admit to being a reader of fiction more than anything else. Early attempts at non-fiction mostly failed. I would borrow a book, on say, the Wars of the Roses, spend that first afternoon absorbed in it, then return it to the library two weeks later without ever having opened it again. Although I am not on a strictly fictional diet, the non-fiction I do read is very selective, often first hand, or else extremely narrative, and when I want to know about the Wars of the Roses, I go to Wikipedia.

This interest in fiction does not mean that I just read light novels. I’m a big believer in balance, and this extends to what I read. Too much pop fiction makes you silly , and too many heavy classics make you pretentious. So read both. Each provides a welcome relief from the other.

Which leads me to a series called The Great Illustrated Classics. If you are not familiar with them, they are hardcover, with huge font, and a black and white picture on every other page. The provide the plot at the expense of any deeper meaning, and introduced me to the likes of Dickens and Dumas. These summaries taught me to appreciate the classics, and to not feel intimidated by them. Ultimately they were the gateway to Les Miserables, not a part of the collection, but which I read my Freshman year of High School. At 1062 pages, it was the longest book I’d read to date, and I still rank it among my literary accomplishments.

So why do I read? I suppose the answer is ultimately very simple. Entertainment. Habit. Curiosity. All of which are good reasons to read, and to read all the time. For the fact is, there are so many books, and so little time.