The loneliness of the long distance reader

One of the ways to read a Great Book is—well—to just read the text. You set aside secondary texts about the Great Book. You read the Great Book without benefit of an instructor to guide you. Whether your can do it completely on your own without someone with whom to discuss your reading is more problematic. However, you will not always be favored with acquaintances who happen to share your interest in a specific Great Book at the same time as yourself.

What I am talking about is doing something akin to setting off on a long journey without benefit of a map or a guide. You bring some knowledge to the expedition such as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. You know the shortest distance to your destination lies either to the east or west. You have heard that there will be rivers and mountains and deserts you must pass over or through during your travel. You may even recall a map that charts the best way to go.

I do not recommend the method under discussion as a better way to read a Great Book than having a learned and expert guide to instruct you about the Great Book. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have Aristotle at your disposal when reading his Politics? We admire the self taught, yet the self taught possess a flawed erudition.

Despite that, a mystique surrounds the solitary reader. We see her as intrepid, independent, unfettered, and unconventional. These are not virtues, but matters of temperament, yet these temperaments have their place in our lives, and may even assist us in being happy and fulfilled. Playing the part of a rebel often provides relief from the oppression and conformity required to participate in the mundane and ordinary.

It is not always good that our questions receive immediate answers. Hasty judgments are sometimes not the best judgments. Some questions have never been answered to everyone’s satisfaction. Solitary reading can often be an antidote to making hasty judgments. Bewilderment is the norm rather than the exception when it comes to the Great Ideas.

Let us not discount the value of a solitary reading of a Great Book because it leaves too much to the reader’s imagination rather than her understanding. Our understanding is built from ideas we firstly imagine and secondly discover to be true.

My recommendation is that you read one Great Book by yourself, that is, if you have a desire to read a Great Book. You can always stop if you don’t find it productive or pleasing.