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Jan. 20th, 2016 09:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
darchildreUnexpected bonuses of reading a lot of Revolutionary-era American history:
- This is not era-specific, but...so, I am the kind of person who likes to read or listen to or watch the same story over and over. I love new adaptations of my favorite books, I love to read something and then listen to an audiobook of the same thing, I love retellings of my favorite stories. (This is probably a large part of the reason that I read so much fanfiction. And also why I like comics so much.) History is great for that. If I read about an event in one book, there are probably ten other books that want to tell me about the same event, but differently: from another perspective, with a different focus, with new details. So you get the same story but not in the same words and I can experience it again without the fatigue that can sometimes result from experiencing it again in exactly the same way. (I have now read, like, three different books that covered the siege of Boston, I am not tired of it yet, this is awesome.)
- Every once in a while, someone mentions a landmark from the area where I grew up and I get really excited. It's mostly river names. The Brandywine! The Susquehanna! The Rappahannock! I haven't heard those names in years - I had forgotten how beautiful the word "Susquehanna" is.
Somehow unexpected disadvantages of reading a lot of history:
- Everyone dies. This is obvious and I should have fully realized it going in but everyone dies, and it's terrible, and I am not okay. In fiction you can pretend they didn't die.
- Also, it is even harder to explain to people that you are upset about people in history dying. If people ask you why you seem down and you tell them that a fictional character died in your book and you're sad about it, they might be taken aback for a moment but they usually sort of get it. If you tell them that, say, George Washington died in your book and you're sad about it, people kinda blink at you like "He's been dead for a while now, shouldn't you be over it?"
This has been Sara's Adventures in Reading History.
- This is not era-specific, but...so, I am the kind of person who likes to read or listen to or watch the same story over and over. I love new adaptations of my favorite books, I love to read something and then listen to an audiobook of the same thing, I love retellings of my favorite stories. (This is probably a large part of the reason that I read so much fanfiction. And also why I like comics so much.) History is great for that. If I read about an event in one book, there are probably ten other books that want to tell me about the same event, but differently: from another perspective, with a different focus, with new details. So you get the same story but not in the same words and I can experience it again without the fatigue that can sometimes result from experiencing it again in exactly the same way. (I have now read, like, three different books that covered the siege of Boston, I am not tired of it yet, this is awesome.)
- Every once in a while, someone mentions a landmark from the area where I grew up and I get really excited. It's mostly river names. The Brandywine! The Susquehanna! The Rappahannock! I haven't heard those names in years - I had forgotten how beautiful the word "Susquehanna" is.
Somehow unexpected disadvantages of reading a lot of history:
- Everyone dies. This is obvious and I should have fully realized it going in but everyone dies, and it's terrible, and I am not okay. In fiction you can pretend they didn't die.
- Also, it is even harder to explain to people that you are upset about people in history dying. If people ask you why you seem down and you tell them that a fictional character died in your book and you're sad about it, they might be taken aback for a moment but they usually sort of get it. If you tell them that, say, George Washington died in your book and you're sad about it, people kinda blink at you like "He's been dead for a while now, shouldn't you be over it?"
This has been Sara's Adventures in Reading History.
