Literature Appreciation

Dear person who is reading this,

Hi! I was talking to one of my best friends (HEY ZEE!!) the other day & she said something about books: that it’s amazing how we’re transported from one world to another by just doing the very simple act of reading texts printed on a page, bound in a book. This really got me thinking about literature, in general, and let me just tell you: I FELT A LOT OF FEELS!!

We have so many forms of literature & there is something for everyone out there. Personally, I have never read a book and not learnt something from it. It could be as ‘insignificant’ as a new word but there is always something to take away from books.

I love to read poetry because I can interpret what’s written to my liking and suddenly it’s applicable to my life. The poet could’ve meant something completely different from what I’m taking but it’s like its been built to cater to my thoughts. I love memoirs because I get to live someone else’s life & I get to learn from their mistakes. I love reading graphic novels because I appreciate the beautiful artwork. And most of all, I love fiction because:

I have travelled to places that are far from within my reach and the realm of possibility. I have been to adventures that broke me and built me into the person that I am today. I love being able to escape into a world that has so much more to give to me than my own, a world where I don’t have to pretend to be someone else — I don’t have to be anything, actually. And that’s all you need in life, sometimes. To be a bystander and not have the burden of being someone. It’s so much easier to live in a world that asks nothing of you and so you become nothing…I have also made friends who I grew up with & they live in my head. & since they’re up here, in my mind, they’re always with me.

I strongly believe that getting lost in a book and the imagery of it by virtue of our imagination is probably the closest thing we have to magic in real life. How utterly beautiful is that?

Best,

An Avid Reader xx