Questions & Answers About Reading
Last week my offspring Tara asked me to read a picture book and videotape it for her class of second and third graders. After the students saw the video of me reading the book they had several questions for me. These are my answers to their questions.
1. What genre of books do you like the most?
I like fiction, preferably stories that take me to another time and place. I don’t get to travel much so reading is a way for me to travel in space and in time.
2. When did you start reading?
I don’t remember starting reading so I must have been doing it for a very long time. My parents were immigrants and they did not speak or read English very well. So we did not have a lot of books around the apartment when I was young. I remember reading cereal boxes, the phonebook, and any magazines or books that were around the house. The first book I remember was a book by L Frank Baum called The Magic of Oz. It is one of the books he wrote about the marvelous land of Oz. I still have that book.
3. What is your favorite series? (when you were a kid and as an adult)
As a child my favorite series was the Oz books by L Frank Baum. Being written at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries, these were old books when I started reading in the middle of the 20th century.
I am not currently reading a series of books. One recent series that I enjoyed is a set of nine crime novels by Qiu Xiaolong who was born in Shanghai in 1953 and is now living in St. Louis. Wikipedia says the “books follow Shanghai Chief Inspector Chen Cao, a poetry-quoting cop who writes poems himself. Alongside the plot, the major concern in the books is modern China itself. Each book features quotes from ancient and modern poets, Confucius, insights into Chinese cuisine, architecture, history, politics, herbology and philosophy as well as criminal procedure.
4. What was your favorite book when you were in 2nd and 3rd Grade?
I was in the second and third grade in 1955 and 56. That was a long time ago. My favorite book at that time was called McWhinney’s Jaunt and was written and illustrated by a fairly famous children’s author named Robert Lawson. This was one of his lesser works. The publisher describes it in this way, “McWhinney’s Jaunt is the amazing tale of an eccentric professor who accidentally creates Z gas, an almost magical substance that allows him to pedal his bicycle up into the air. He sets off on a journey all over the United States of America and has many adventures.”
I liked it at the time because, as a child of poor immigrants living in the South Bronx, this was as close as I was going to get to seeing America. It seems strangely prophetic today because I loved bicycling my whole life and I spent over 40 years as a librarian to eccentric engineering professors.
5. What is your favorite book now?
Having been a librarian for over 50 years, this is a very difficult question to pin down to one book. It might be like asking a retired school teacher who was your favorite student. I imagine the teacher would eventually have to settle on the student who had the greatest impact in life, because there were so many who were favorites for many different reasons. Using that criteria, I would say that my favorite book is The Kingdom of God is Within You by Leo Tolstoy. This is the foundational book on Christian nonviolence in western literature. It provides a history of non-violence thinking in the West and formed the thinking of many of the current century’s nonviolent leaders like Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Lither King Jr.
6. What do you find interesting in a book?
Novelty, new information presented in an interesting and clear manner, a story well told. Characters who come to life for me. Places I have never been described in ways that make me feel like I am there.
7. When you were a child what was your favorite library?
This is an easy question to answer. When I was your age living in the South Bronx I had no idea what a library was. When my parents moved to Highland Falls, NY, the town library became my favorite library because it was the only library in town. It was my home away from home. We owe a great deal to small town librarians who bring books and information to rural communities.
8. What is your favorite library now?
My favorite library is The Internet Archive, an online collection of books, magazines, movies, and pictures. I can download items to my computer, tablet, or smart phone without leaving home.
But I think you may have been asking about my favorite library building, a physical space that provides access to information resources. I have a fondness for the library I worked at for 36 years, but it is a university library so it specializes and serves a limited audience. My favorite library is the Seattle Public Library. It provides excellent services and collections in a spectacular space that is inspiring and available to all. My thanks to Tara for introducing me to this library.
9. What time of day do you read?
My favorite times to read are: The newspaper at breakfast, Outdoors in the sun (or the shade in the hot summer) in the middle of the day, and in the middle of the night when I wake up and the house is quiet.
10. How often do you read?
I read books less than I used to, but that is because I am reading screens of print almost all day long.
11. If you were an author, what genre would you want to write?
If I was an author I would like to write poetry. But I am not an author and I am certainly not a poet. What writing I have done has mostly been nonfiction, explaining how things work or who people were.
12. Who encouraged you to read?
My mother encouraged me to read. She bought encyclopedias that sat on shelves in our living room. I think those were the first books that we had as a home library.
13. What type of books did you read when you were a child?
I don’t think I read any particular type of books when I was a child. I did love comic books. DC comics were big at that time And Marvel comics were just starting out. I used to go to the public library and scan the shelves in the children’s room picking out any book that interested me.
14.Would you prefer to read with an e-reader or a paper book?
As far as reading goes, I don’t have a preference for which medium I use. I like that I can make the print larger or smaller on an E reader. But I like that I can share a paper book with others and give it to friends. Since I always have my smart phone with me, I like having a book on my phone so I can read it anytime, anywhere.
My thanks to Ms Pozo’s students at Thoreau Elementary School for the thought provoking questions. I’ve had to think long and hard about some of these answers, and I may have talked more than you expected. I hope I didn’t bore you with my answers.
