Read Long Books
Friction is a key element to growth.
If for no other reason, do it to spite the times.
Read long novels. Challenge yourself with focus. Invest in characters and let them live with you for weeks. Cry when they leave you.
This is the artistic poverty of our time: breadth without depth. We are flat stones skipping across the water. Splashing along the surface. These trillion-dollar companies have become expert stone throwers, skipping us further and further, counting our skips in stock price peaks.
If for no other reason, read long books to prove you aren’t for sale.
I just finished East of Eden. I read it 18 years ago and it changed my life. I have a ’timshel’ tattoo on the back of my neck. But a lot of life has been lived since I was 25. I started it again a few times here and there, but never finished it. This time, I did. It took me weeks. And I was left in tears on the beach. Moved in ways I couldn’t have been in my twenties. Identifying with different characters and feeling my soul expand wide and deep.
There is a richness that only comes from work. From investment. From the friction of labor.
This is why the Odyssey is such a lavish viewing experience and the latest Avengers trailer feels like a tired Temu ad. The stories of how hard it was to make the Odyssey, the obsessive care and craftsmanship, the in-camera work and sparing CGI, are imbedded in the enjoyment. We absorb the storytelling while also marveling at the achievement.
Holding a 600 page novel in your hands, knowing that some focused and obsessed mind built a world of human emotion, adds to the nourishment of its absorption.
Back in the fall of 2024, I moved into a tiny cabin in the mountains to reclaim my focus and detoxify from the churn of modern life. I promised myself I’d finally read Moby Dick. And I did. I had tried many times before, but this time g-dammit, I’d do it. The pride I felt on that last page… I’ll never forget. There are so many great books that go unread. Not from lack of want, but lack of focus. Lack of will. I was tired of that dull-hum of failure. I wrote about the experience of finally reading what I’d always wanted to read, and finally thinking thoughts I never allowed myself to think, in my new book Go Quiet on the Mountain. Pre-order it if you can pretty please! If your brain is tired by the modern world, I think you’ll find it helpful. That experiment changed my life. I’m excited to show you how.
If only to reject the times, if only to prove to yourself that you’re in the driver’s seat of your soul, read long books.
And if you’re lucky, cry on the beach when you read the last sentence.
I hope my new book makes you cry.
Love you,
Jed.
So excited to get my hungry hands on your new book! I'm ready!
So so so true. Good fiction is like a friend, like all of humanity coming to open your heart. There is nothing else like taking in someone else's work through your eyes and feeling it all in your heart. I love when a book takes me by surprise like the one I am reading now that I picked up on a whim at the library. I have not read East of Eden but thanks for the inspiration. I have read War and Peace, though, and that was an accomplishment!