Books to Reread

Vladimir Nabokov in his essay “Good Readers and Good Writers” says:

Curiously enough, one cannot read a book: one can only reread it. A good reader, a major reader, an active and creative reader is a rereader.”

He goes on to explain why. In short, unlike a painting, which can be grasped in its totality in the first experience with it, a book requires first an active effort to consume it. This effort stands in the way of fully appreciating it. Only once that task is done, in rereading can you really appreciate what the author aimed to convey.

On that note, here’s my list of books to reread:

• One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

• Solaris by Stanislaw Lem

• War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

• Ada, or Ardor by Vladimir Nabokov

• Remembrance of Earth’s Past by Liu Cixin (also known by its first and most famous book The Three-Body Problem)