Seanan McGuire (seanan_mcguire) wrote,
Seanan McGuire
seanan_mcguire
  • Mood: thoughtful
  • Music: Little Shop, 'Mushnik and Son.'

Interesting things to ponder.

This fascinating article in the Baltimore City Paper talks about the books we loved when we were twelve, and how they never ever leave us. It opens with a quote that really resonates with me:

"A girl I once caught reading Fahrenheit 451 over my shoulder on the subway confessed: "You know, I'm an English lit major, but I've never loved any books like the ones I loved when I was 12 years old." I fell slightly in love with her when she said that. It was so frank and uncool, and undeniably true."

I have found books that I love every year of my life. I am a person who reads, I've been a person who reads for almost my entire time on this planet, and I go through a lot of brand new books every month (often to the chagrin of my budget). And yet...

The books I go back to, the books that comfort me when I feel bad, the books that lift me up when I'm feeling down, are largely books I encountered between the ages of nine and twelve. I'll go up one level on that, since that was also the period of my life where Xanth and Dragonlance reigned supreme: they're the books that emotionally moved me between the ages of nine and twelve. Tailchaser's Song. The Last Unicorn. IT. The Stand. War for the Oaks. There are others -- oh, there are others -- and so many of them source back to that same stretch of time.

I'd argue that you can fall in love with the way an author uses language, as much as a specific use of language, and that it's also at its most powerful when it happens between those ages. Hence my total inability to get over my love for Stephen King (not that I really want to). Hence the comic geeks of the world and their insistence on viewing whichever death of Jean Grey happened during their 'imprint years' as the only real time she died. (Personally, I'll take any of her deaths, as long as she promises to stay dead.)

I'd be curious about how universal this is. But is strikes me as being something that's very true for a lot of us, and somehow manages to be practically invisible at the same time. Pretty cool.
Tags: contemplation, reading things, stephen king
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  • 51 comments

kyra_neko_rei

November 27 2008, 06:53:50 UTC 8 years ago

The ones that stand out for me are the Star Wars Trilogy novelizations and The Clan of the Cave Bear, both when I was twelve. And, then, a couple short stories: Kipling's "The Undertakers," and "The Game of Rat and Dragon" by Cordwainer Smith.

*pokes brain* Come on, I know there was a lot more than that, before/during/under/around the read-romance-novels-for-the-sex-scenes*-despite-wanting-to-kill-the-male-lead thing I had going on for awhile.

*if I had not found internet fandom and its vast supply of porn, I would be so insane right now . . .

I'd argue that you can fall in love with the way an author uses language

Oh HELLS, yes.

Oooh, remembered another: the novelization of Paint Your Wagon for sheer, beautiful, clever, wonderful prose. But then I would read complete and utter crap if it had shiny prose. It draws me in like certain people ;) might be drawn towards a sign saying "Velociraptor eggs, viable, free to good home."

seanan_mcguire

November 27 2008, 17:01:44 UTC 8 years ago

...did you see that sign somewhere recently? Um. Somewhere that I could get to? Or can shipping be arranged? (Kate's in Connecticut, she can't tell me no!)

kyra_neko_rei

November 28 2008, 01:44:40 UTC 8 years ago

Ohhh, that would be lovely. But sadly, no.

I reread Jurassic Park today. Much velociraptor love. That part where they interact with the baby raptor in the nursery, I could've melted. (And now I have a new response whenever somebody asks me when I'm going to have kids.)