Random Notes on Bibliotherapy, Beyond Brené, and Bookishness
— During the pandemic years, I had contemplated getting certified in bibliotherapy, or taking up the study of bibliotherapy as a more serious endeavour as an amateur, anyway. That didn’t happen, but I did realize what I enjoy doing is making booklists, and assembling stacks of books and then seeing how and what they say to each other. (I should admit that I’m also fascinated by bibliomancy as a thing to study rather than practice. — I mean it worked to bring Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning together). As someone who has a Masters in English Literature, has written and published over 10 books, has worked in a variety of libraries and bookstores for somewhere over and around 20 years….I feel like I bring something to the bibliotherapy table. That said, sometimes side hobbies are best left as such.
— I’ve been thinking about how we read library books versus books we own. Maybe you are very pristine with the books you buy but I am not :) Longtime readers know I’m a fan of the dog ear, of underlining, writing notes in the margins, and also sticky tabs. Obviously, I don’t write in library books, but the tabs work, and making notes in a notebook work. (And yes I detach the tabs before returning because I know what a pain they are to remove). The point of doing this is so that I can read the book and then return to bits that I wanted to revisit afterwards. Sometimes I’ll write down a quotation, and sometimes I’ll share a line or two here on my blog.
— Sometimes a stack of books seems to assemble itself :) One book will remind me of another book. One perspective will draw me to another. What if these thoughts sat beside these other ones? What if you could overhear these two authors having a conversation? Where do they coincide, diverge, spark entirely new thoughts? Now, that is the fun of reading, right?
— I think most of these books in the photo below have been chatted about in this space at one time or another. They’re sort of my bibliotherapy list for figuring out the day job life, or just life really. They’re what I call my beyond Brené books. (Fun fact, who knows why but the idea of the golden unicorn during the pandemic just made me so angry at BB lol. Talking about a worker thus: “That’s the reason we started, is the golden unicorn, because that’s the person who has been in the company for, just like you said, long enough to have incredible, deep understanding of culture, history, where we’ve been, where we’re going, values, ethics.”
— Why was I incensed? The unicorn just seemed so sacrificial, so incidental, manipulated, used? Anyway, what do I know. Absolutely niente. I’ve come to believe that leadership books are just none of my little business.
— So then I came across Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara. I don’t love books about restaurants and fancy food but I thought I’d just hate read it a bit and set it aside. You know, I’m not above that kind of behaviour at all. The trouble is I like the word unreasonable. And I’m interested in hospitality. (I wrote about hospitality in terms of The Odyssey and Xenia here previously). Guidara quotes an anonymous woman who he once interviewed for a job who says that “service is black and white; hospitality is colour.” Which I kind of love (though wish the appropriate person had been given the credit. Maybe she is credited somewhere and I missed it). (As someone who takes and looks at and thinks overmuch on photography I also have a lot more to say about bw vs colour lol but that’s another discussion). I agree when he says that “whatever you do for a living, you can choose to be in the hospitality business.” He says good stuff about enthusiasm (which I’ve been trying to regain at my pre-pandemic level for years now lol). I like what he says about making the “charitable assumption.” I like how he took criticism about how one of his restaurants needed “a bit of Miles Davis” and how he goes on to interpret that. I like his line, “The way you do one thing is the way you do everything” because it echoes something in adrienne marie brown’s book. I like how he understands that people with delicate antennae might be “needy” but are also very worth it in the long run. I like the hotdog anecdote. And I like the idea of “giving people more than they expect.” So in the end it wasn’t a hate read at all, even though I did have to turn to Shop Class as Soulcraft again after as a palate cleanser.
— Although the approaches and stances are different in all these books, they are all interested in what a good life might look like. What are the conditions that might make a good life? Honestly, don’t we all want to be excellent? It’s just the conditions often work against us. Of course all of these books were written before the AI overlords came into being. And I should be curious and enthusiastic and at the very least interested, but also, we’re already seeing the repercussions which for some are amazing, but for most working class and creative class folks sucks. Jobs are being cut, attritioned, dumbed down, etc etc etc. On the plus side, there must be an opportunity to imagine new futures in science fiction.
— Last night, I sat down and read a book in one sitting: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. If you’re an underliner, let’s just say you’ll be doing a lot of underlining. Does this book just keep getting more and more relevant??
— I continue to think about the Curriculum Trend, as it’s called. This stack of books has been mine this past year (and before). Not that I would have thought of it like that. (Likely I’ve thought of it more as personal bibliotherapy).
— And now onward….looking for the next stack of reads that will shape my upcoming year.
