Preface to A Year of Books that are Older than Me

Well, this new year is slightly used at this point, but here is the reading challenge I intend to tackle this year. Really, I’m still a rather Distractible Reader, so it will be more like a reading focus in which I hope to engage for the next 12 months. I’ve already spent a year on books I’ve read before and a year plus of books I should have read by now.

This year I’m going to read books that are older than me.

I’ve made no restrictions on the volumes I’ll read beyond the publication date. I hope to have them range from ancient classics to, well, somewhat modern books published just before I was born. Some will be books I’ve read before while others will be books I probably should have already read, and still others will be books I don’t know much about but have nevertheless piqued my curiosity.

I usually get quite distracted from my self-imposed reading challenges, especially by new books, tempters and temptresses on the public library shelves, and by books generously given to me as gifts. (Actually I’ve done much better at sticking with my reading plan in the last couple years than I thought I might be. I did recently acquire some new books that are burning a hole in my bookshelves, however, so we’ll see what happens.)

In addition to being distractible, I’m also not a very fast reader and I have a bit of a busy schedule (which includes keeping up with my other blog), so - and I feel a little bad about this – I don’t finish books or write about them as often as I’d like. That being said, this is just a personal reading journal by an amateur reader with no formal training in analysis of literature. I like to read, plain and simple, and here’s where I communicate to whoever cares to follow along what I think about what I’ve read.

And so begins the Year of Books that are Older than Me…

 

Coming soon: The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

 

 

A Year of Books that are Older than Me