Reading and my memory.

Bipolar Joe · 08-03-2015 03:59AM #1

I have a really selective memory. I can remember lyrics to songs I've only heard once twenty years ago, the full dialogue for tons of movies, but it's nearly impossible for me to get through a book. I get ten to twenty pages in, and realise that I can't remember how it began, who the fuck these people are, so on. Does anyone else here have a similar problem?

I'd like to read more, there's lots of cool detective novels (I've seen the film versions of) that I want to read, but I have such an issue getting through them. I'm not dyslexic, it's just my stupid memory.

Dozer Dave · 08-03-2015 04:04AM

Does page 3 of the sun stall you in your tracks op?

buried · 08-03-2015 04:09AM

I'd recommend some Charles Bukowski novels for you OP. Especially 'post office' and 'ham on rye'. I know exactly what you mean, you have to kind of trick yourself into a state of concentration, but books like Bukowsi's will make it easier and you can follow on from there

Bipolar Joe · 08-03-2015 04:25AM

It's funny you should say that! Factotum is one book I can almost completely recall, and I remember various quotes from Fante and Ginsberg. I think maybe because they're books about nothing in particular. Just people writing for the sake of writing. I sometimes feel bad that I'll never read Iliad, The Idiot or Don Quixote, because I've tried and I just get lost, confused and frustrated.

Mint Aero · 08-03-2015 04:32AM

Visualising the characters in their underwear helps. Or is that public speaking? Oh yeah, read it aloud even in public to remember it better. In your underwear. Yeah that was it, read books in your underwear.

MarkAnthony · 08-03-2015 04:33AM

Engage your speech centre when you read. It's a social convention not to move your lips when you read and like many of them completely counter productive and propagated by ignorant people who value conformity over results.

The reason you're remembering lyrics and movie dialogue is because you're hearing it.

buried · 08-03-2015 04:34AM

Haha! Class! That's exactly it though, books about nothing in particular but written in a engrossing way that sucks you in, that's what Bukowski's stuff is really, and its entertaining too! 'Hells Angels' by Hunter S. Thompson is another good one to check out too. I do know exactly what you mean about concentration Joe, but once you find the books that can entertain you, you can read anything, doesn't matter if its the Iliad or whatever, its all about finding a subject matter that gives you the imaginative entertainment from reading it

Bipolar Joe · 08-03-2015 04:41AM

MarkAnthony wrote: »

Engage your speech centre when you read. It's a social convention not to move your lips when you read and like many of them completely counter productive and propagated by ignorant people who value conformity over results.

The reason you're remembering lyrics and movie dialogue is because you're hearing it.

"When he read, his eyes scanned the page and his heart sought out the meaning, but his voice was silent and his tongue was still. Anyone could approach him freely and guests were not commonly announced so that often when we came to visit him, we found him reading like this in silence, for he never read aloud." I heard that some place but I dunno where.

I'm gonna have the most depressingly pretentious book collection ever.

Reading and my memory.

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