Books as events

Stendhal

Stendhal once said that a good book "is an event in my life." How true that is.

Just as we who are old enough remember where we were when JFK was assassinated, when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon and when the Twin Towers collapsed, so we may remember where we were when we read certain notable books.

Most of the books I've read over the years bring back no specific memories of actually reading them. Some books I cannot remember reading at all. Yet I remember reading Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne while stretched out on my bed when I was in my early teens. I remember reading 1984 in my college dormitory. I recall reading Lonesome Dove on a family vacation trip to Arkansas. 

To be sure, these memories can have as much to do with circumstances as with the books themselves. Excellent books read in my comfortable reading chair are less likely to carry vivid memories into the future, simply because I read so many book there. But read a good book under unusual circumstances, such as on a cruise or in a hospital bed, and the memory may last forever, or at least for as long as you do.