Posted by: Sally Ingraham | April 17, 2010

Jesup Reading Marathon: Nights 3 & 4

With two more evenings spent at the library, my participation in the reading marathon came to an end. On Thursday and Friday night I headed over there after working from 8 in the morning at ONECS* until 3, and then at the movie theater from 3:45 until around 9:30. To my own astonishment I still managed to stay (mostly) awake for about 3 hours both nights, and I got through the third section of The Bros K, and read another 35 pages of the Perec. I’m still ecstatic over the Perec – it’s seriously wonderful. The third section of The Bros K was far more entertaining than the second, but I’m still finding the book as a whole somewhat underwhelming.

It was quieter at the library on Thursday, but busy again on Friday night. It was great to see people not only reading, but utilizing other library services like the computers and doing puzzles. I’m hoping that after seeing that people really appreciated the library being open at night, the director and board might be willing to consider keeping it open regularly in the evening – nothing outrageous, but at least until 8 or 9 on a few nights. It’s a great place to hang out, and people who have day jobs like me, who can’t get to the library during 10a.m.-5p.m. hours of operation would really appreciate some evening hours! We’ll see what happens. 🙂

Anyway, since I love lists and stats, here’s my sum up of my four night reading marathon:

Total Hours: 16
Total pages: 471

Proust: 40 pages
Perec: 86 pages
Dostoevsky: 345 pages

I had some loose goals for the week, which I feel like I accomplished. I would have liked to have read more of Sodom and Gomorrah, but focusing on The Bros K was ultimately more useful, as I now have only the last 300 pages or so of that enormous tome. And now that I’ve pretty much moved out of town and back into the little cabin, far away from cable TV (and internet too…), I’ll have plenty of time to finish my April reading stack!

Jesup Memorial Library will be open until 5 o’clock today, at which time the reading marathon will officially end. I think it was highly successful, and a huge thanks to the librarians and our lovely director for organizing it. Happy National Library Week! 🙂

*I’m tired of spelling this – Our New England Country Store – out, so it’s going to be ONECS from now on!


Responses

  1. Thanks for volunteering your time, Sarah! If I didn’t live quite so far away I would have taken more advantage of the extended hours. Congrtulations on all your reading. Impressive, as usual.

    • Thanks Julie! Lets plan our own little reading marathon sometime (a. k. a. a glorified sleepover!) 🙂

  2. What do you think of the Proust these days, Sarah? I’m finding it intermittently rewarding, but it’s such a slog to read compared to the Bolaño and Perec stuff that keeps calling my name! P.S. Perec’s book, as fun as it is on its own, is also having the added benefit of making me want to take on another Italo Calvino book soon. Ace storytellers both.

    • I have definitely been eyeing the list of Perec’s other work with interest – I want to read ’em all! 🙂 ‘Intermittently rewarding’ is a good way to discribe my perusal of S&G as well. I really need to sit down with it and read a sizeable chunck all at once so that I can find the swing of the language again. This one is tougher than the first three for me. I can’t imagine coming to it without having read the others – your feat is impressive! 🙂


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