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Sunday, 20 May 2018

A modest total


I don’t read much non-fiction but the other day I went through my Kindle to see how many non-fiction books I’d read in the previous year. Turned out to be twenty two which is only a modest total but more respectable than I would have guessed.

Where does all the reading time come from though? It is partly a consequence of being retired but much of it comes from not watching TV. That was my initial impression on totting up the non-fiction books – reading is what I do instead of TV.

TV must have wasted a vast amount of time which could have been used more constructively. Not would have been used of course, but could have been used. I’m sure it has done far more harm than we ever acknowledge.

3 comments:

James Higham said...

TV. I’ve heard the acronym before.

Scrobs. said...

I couldn't agree more, Mr H!

Since we stopped watching the TV (BBC mainly) last September, Mrs O'Blene and I have just demolished books every day, and, I have discovered so many superb writers in the process!

I know you are a skilled author, and understand the 'work', but since I started reading good writing and - as a recent post described, a proper classic by Nevil Shute, the meaning of self-instruction takes on a new image especially as I'm now nearly seventy-one!

Being retired nowadays is an art I think. I meet friends and chat happily, I love my village, I can get exercise when I think I might need it, and I can treasure every waking moment. Smug - me? Maybe, but I had a huge hug with a chum whose daddy died last Friday. I'd known him for over forty years.

Comes and goes; life...

A K Haart said...

James - it's a disease which may be dying out.

Scrobs - yes TV seems to cut us off from part of ourselves, the part that simply wants to get on with real life.