The joy of reading books you don't understand
Readers trade tips and war stories about tackling books that are initially beyond their grasp—from dense philosophy and math texts to sprawling novels like Infinite Jest or The Baroque Cycle. Many argue there’s value in immersion, rereading, and tolerating confusion as a way to expand one’s conceptual world, while others counter that opacity can signal poor writing or empty “literary” posturing. The exchange broadens into questions of how much authors should guide understanding, how note‑taking and background study fit in, and whether education and culture now overemphasize ease and instant clarity at the expense of deeper engagement.
Value of Not Fully Understanding
- Many participants enjoy books that initially exceed their grasp (philosophy, dense SF, hard literary fiction, math, technical texts, scripture).
- Partial comprehension can still be emotionally powerful and plant “conceptual hooks” that pay off years later.
- Some describe a distinctive pleasure in immersion, even when plot, references, or arguments are only half-grasped.
Strategies: How People Read Hard Stuff
- Common pattern: first read for immersion with no notes or prerequisites, then later passes with background material or annotations.
- Others strongly prefer slow reading, backtracking, and filling in missing prerequisites, sometimes over years.
- Note-taking is debated:
- Some avoid it on first pass, especially for fiction, to preserve flow.
- Others rely on extensive notes, sticky tabs, or phone notes for dense non‑fiction and philosophy.
- For textbooks, many argue that doing exercises is more important than rereading explanations.
When Difficulty Helps vs. When It’s Nonsense
- Several see confusion as productive: tolerating not knowing, then letting patterns emerge over time.
- Others caution that not every “difficult” work is deep; some older or theorist-heavy texts are viewed as overrated, obscurantist, or “balderdash.”
- There’s tension between treating all canonized works as profound versus recognizing that some may simply be mediocre but historically privileged.
Psychology, Identity, and Motivation
- Some suggest the need to understand everything may be tied to self-esteem, though others link it more to self-efficacy and curiosity.
- Readers vary between seeking “books that bite and sting” and preferring comfort, clarity, or entertainment; both modes are defended.
- Several admit to feeling like “posers” when they enjoyed but didn’t deeply retain difficult works, yet others stress it’s fine to enjoy without mastery.
Culture, Education, and Media Habits
- A theme: modern expectations that authors must make everything easy, versus older or “Eastern” attitudes where the burden is on the reader.
- University teaching is described by some as more about filtering than instruction, making hard, opaque courses perversely valuable for deep learning.
- People notice a broader trend of seeking “the correct take” from comments or summaries, rather than wrestling personally with challenging books, films, or games.