For pretty much my whole life, I’ve read a lot. I’ve never really thought about why, other than the fact that I know that not reading makes me depressed. Thinking about why seems to be weirdly self defeating but for the purpose of this entry, I’ll give it a shot.
Maybe it’s simple, it’s an easy way to escape.
Maybe it’s a little more complex, it’s a way to experience the truly addictive sensation of having mind shaped by a skillful and nuanced hand, however temporarily.
Whatever the truth is, for me reading is a singular experience in our lives because it is the most precise method we have of recreational mind control. It’s also the most personally challenging. Being entertained is not complicated and for many people such as myself who are constantly in a state of critical flux, the ability to sit back and not think for a short amount of time is pretty revolutionary. To do so by considering a reality that has Dragons in it may be silly, but I ask how much sillier is it to do it by choosing to consider a reality where there are none?
Now, to be clear, I don’t mean this as some kind of slight on the everyday world in which you and I immerse ourselves on a daily basis, so please, don’t take it personally. I like “reality” just fine. Reality is it, as far as I’m concerned. But it just means that when I read that because of my need to be enthralled, it’s pretty much all pretty fantastical fiction cause I’ve never been super interested in escaping to a reality that seems to be totally unmagical, without any kind of awesome psychic potential and totally devoid of the Force. I can’t help it, I love the idea that there exist universes where there are forces that are specifically tasked with enabling humanity to have adventures. Where things aren’t quite so random. That there are sources of energy that can misfire or energise individuals and endow them with a destiny. Where destiny actually exists. It’s one of the reasons that when I was younger, I was really addicted to comics, their entire concept is modeled around this kind of awesomeneess. So, I am a big fan of stories with universal rules that make regular life seem mundane. I find them comforting. The rules.
Like Superman is invulnerable, except for when he’s exposed to Kryptonite.
Or Agents can only possess the bodies of people who are still plugged into the Matrix.
Or Batman can beat bad guys bloodier than most psychopaths, but they’ll never ever die from it.
I just fucking love the rules and what they make possible. Like by messing with the limitations of reality makes the unreality of a story seem more real. I also fucking love how in comics the rules set up a basic world, a kind of common language that allows different writers with completely different writing styles to riff with the same character. The process of learning the rules becomes the process of learning the language. And once you take the time to learn the language, you can understand the whole culture in a personal manner that’s simply beyond the casual indulgence of the phrase book or big budget movie.
However, eventually even the language itself becomes so tried and tested that there’s very little new or genuinely original that can be said. For example writers have been giving their spin on the “Batman” genesis story since the early 40‘s and while I still love to hear the different and new emphasis, I also love it when writers sit down, go back to basics and think, “What If?”. When they sit down and try out an entirely new way of saying the same thing. So, this “What If?” itself becomes a kind of new language, exotic and foreign in a way that in my world of instant information and cheap travel, no longer exists.
Like what if Captain America had been created by the Nazis?. What if Batman had been a Vampire?. What if Spiderman has landed in Russia? What if RoboCop had been a Magical Wooden Golum in a Jewish Ghetto?
Or what if the entire cast of Superheroes and Supervillains were transplanted into Elizabethan Europe?
Or put more simply, the plot of Neil Gaiman’s truly epic graphic novel: 1602.
I’d read it if I were you.
