I wrote this "Literary Odyssey" four years ago in my senior high school English class (2002!). I still like it for the most part, and so I decided I would begin my blogger with it as sort of an introduction to me, "Reading Rachel."
I was reading before I knew how to sound out the words: I memorized them. I made my mother read The Four Little Kittens to me so often I simply began to recognize the words as she spoke them, both of us curled up in my parents' bed for story time. I'm sure by the point I was reciting that classic Little Golden book, she knew all the words by heart several times over. I sped through picture books, a sight-reader who had (and still has) little use for phonics or actually saying the words in my head. Goodnight Moon lulled me to sleep and Jan Brett's realistic illustrations captured my eye.
The stories simply soaked in, absorbed into my memory, feeding my imagination. My make-believe world included wild horses, pure white unicorns, and young heroines (who tended to possess curly brown hair---astonishingly similar to my own). Before I moved on to idolizing the horsewoman who breathed and drank in the equine life, I fervently wished that I was the wild black stallion, free to follow the direction of the wind and choose which humans to grace with my companionship and trust. Model horses became my characters, each with a name that suited the personality I developed. My family consisted of Misty, Midnight, Mischief, and Miracle. They bonded together in traditional (human) family units, inspiring me to transform my room into a racetrack for legendary Man O' War and a steeplechase course for Velvet Brown and her piebald jumper. I could become lost in their world, visualizing the stable, with the fresh scent of hay (and maybe on an overcast day the less pleasant smells that accompany a barn). But books would always make my day brighter and sweet-scented.
Fantasy and science fiction raised me up from my days spent on all four limbs in my attempt to emulate my animal heroes. I didn't have to be as wild a spirit as the mustang; I could instead uncover magical talents. An entire universe of dragons, talking rodents, and tesseracts was awaiting my discovery. In the fourth grade A Wrinkle in Time transported me to a place where the strength of one's mind and love for others would prevail over the hateful evil. I strove to prove to myself that I possessed an advanced intellect like Charles Wallace and other characters I idealized. Who wouldn't want to have the powers of Mathilda? This meant reading faster, longer, harder. I would become the best reader in the world, and if I immersed myself in fictitious lore, perhaps I could discover my own supernatural power. I was destined to save all creatures and mankind from the enemies I encountered in books, every villain compiled together to form the greatest threat anyone had ever faced!
What a sad letdown to find that I was a mere human, with no ability to talk to animals or communicate telepathically. I was ordinary. Slowly I understood that I was not the only child who experienced this discontent with everyday life. Literature saturated the imagination with desires and hopes beyond what could be attained. We children are not born heroes, destined to live through miraculous adventures that always ended happily ever after. We discovered that in the real world we would have to become heroes and heroines; we would have to struggle to overcome the villains, human and nonhuman, who crossed our paths. I was in denial---there must be some hidden magic in life my ignorance concealed from me. I felt the enchantment from words I read, strung together just right to reverberate through my mind. I sensed the truth of Arnold Bennett's declarations: "the makers of literature are those who have seen and felt the miraculous interestingness of the universe. If you have formed . . . literary taste . . . your life will be one long ecstasy of denying that the world is a dull place." I waited in vain for a sign that what I read was reality.
The way to escape that ordinariness was to sink into fiction, to become the characters. I went into spurts of reading specific genres or authors. During my historical fiction kick, I read Ann Rinaldi regularly, thinking that perhaps one day I would be immortalized in a novel; someone would collect the bare facts and transform me into a heroine. Of course, I would need to accomplish something first, or so I dreamed. I could change the path of history, improve the lives of thousands or millions, synthesize theories, save a world leader, or overcome great adversity to rise above the masses. But I was simply a suburban kid from Vernon Hills with potential and a desire to live a storybook life. As Gustave Flaubert asserted, "The one way of tolerating existence is to lose oneself in literature."
So I constantly reread, shifting between Ursula Le Guin, Madeleine L'Engle, Dune, and other favorites from years gone by. I search for the characteristics I love in the novels I read, desperately wishing that I could combine their stories to create a life I want to live, one with an infinite number of variations. With every book, I find a new detail to add to my personal fantasy. All the while I know I have to find my own reality and a unique voice. I only wish I had the creative genius to write a fantasy, my own fiction to which I could return and every aspect of it would belong utterly to me, from plot, to style, to characters. Perhaps, someday, I will write the perfect life for me.
For now, reading is my passion, my solace. My mother occasionally threatens to ground me from reading---the penalty she knows could potentially be the most difficult for me to adhere to. Germaine Greer succinctly said, "Reading was my first solitary vice (and led to all others). I read while I ate, I read in the loo, I read in the bath. When I was supposed to be sleeping, I was reading." To unwind, I read. When I should be doing homework, I read. I suspend everything and let myself fall into the words. Lyrical works sweep me along, a finely tuned symphony orchestra performing just for me in that moment. If I find the piece worthy, I can close my eyes and conjure the images long after the physical portals are closed. Reading opens my life to original ideas, allows me to find connections between myself and others, and still feed my imagination. Because literature becomes a part of me forever, I can shelve a memory, but I will never forget a reading experience. It is what prompts me to strive for greatness among the stars of thinkers. It is what makes me complete.
