in defense of binge-reading
I've always been a binge-reader. When I was a kid, I would spend all day feverishly finishing a book only to flip back to the first page and feverishly re-finish it into the night. These days, I'm not sure every book necessarily warrants an immediate reread (though some most definitely do), but I'm still an advocate for reading a book a day. Most recently, I read Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin in just under 48 hours, and often finish my favorite books in around that time span. I've been inclined to ask myself why that is, why I latch desperately onto a novel I adore only for the experience to be over that much quicker, but I'm not sure I have an answer. Instead, let's talk about why I enjoy it, rather than why at all.
Escapism (& lack thereof)
I'm sure we know the term. Escapism, while typically used to bad-mouth social media for all of its mind-numbingness, can be a good thing, a great thing even. Remember childhood me, who would read forever, ever, and ever if she could? She did so to escape the cafeteria, the mean snot-nosed big-kids, the sticky table, the smells (god, the smells) of her elementary school burned forever into her brain, except when she was reading. When she read, everything disappeared, and it was nothing short of a magic trick.
Nowadays, I don't need books to pull me out of reality. In fact, I find them much more grounding than the brick in my pocket capable of taking me anywhere around the world with a few clicks. I needed to escape back then, but it's books that keep me in touch with the world outside of my phone as an adult. It's an easier leap to go touch grass when you're already touching paper, I guess.
Engagement (& boredom)
Reading books slowly is a surefire way to get me to care very little very quickly. In school, when we'd take several excruciating months to read a single book, I always found myself either ditching the story altogether or reading ahead, especially when we weren't allowed to do the latter. Slugging through every story was impossible for me, as I find myself most engaged when I can easily recall prior references and when the pace of the novel isn't interrupted by my life and its happenings. When I read piecemeal, I almost always end up injecting how I'm feeling about my day into my experience of reading the book, and I don't think its deserving of that. Reading in one session, to me, preserves the original intention of the novel as it was written. Plus, I get to the ending much faster, and the suspense-knot being tied in my stomach can loosen. That's always nice.
Enlightenment (I didn't plan the "E" thing I swear... well not originally but once I realized then I did feed into it a little)
Reading is hard. When you've accustomed yourself to passively consuming mindless content for years (I still love YouTube, but I have my limits), it can be difficult to motivate yourself to end the day with a book you have to read yourself instead of a homepage with content algorithmically chosen to entertain you. I personally put off reading for years for this reason, and convinced myself that the benefit would not equal the energy I had to expend to get it. As you're probably guessing, I was wrong. One of my favorite things about binge-reading is how it stays in my memory. I can recall an entire book as though it were a movie, including where I read it, what month it was, and even what the weather was like when I was reading. I have plenty of favorite YouTube videos, but I wouldn't bet any amount of money on my being able to guess how old I was I first watched them, or even more than three salient details about the video. Meanwhile, I have quotes stored in my head from nearly every book I read in the last year, in addition to new vocabulary and turns of phrase I can pull from whenever I want. Reading has turned my mind from mush into a toolbox, and I cannot thank it enough for that. As tough as it can be to pick up a book when I'm tired, I try to remember how much better I'll feel for doing it.
I'm sure my binge-reading younger self would be pleased.