Why I Read Fiction

As most of you already know, I accepted the call to be a traveling husband while my wife finishes her studies in Amman. Upon landing, my first order of business was to find a bookstore. Kristi and I took our guidebook's advice and trekked out to a small bookstore/coffeeshop in downtown Amman. 

I don't really like bookstore/coffeeshops. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because one is a disseminator of knowledge, while the other produces mere mocha and free wifi. Maybe I see the backslash as a futile attempt to reconcile the deep concentration required for reading with the rapid, mindless humor of tweets and status updates. Bookstores are not social networks. They're where I go to escape social networks.

Nevertheless, we browsed the merchandise. Economics, Business, Politics, Humor, Sex, Mystery, and Love. Titles like, Whatever You Think, Think The Opposite and Don't Take the Last Donut: New Rules of Business Ettiquette and Finding Your Love Without Losing Your Life. I passed all these with a frenzy

I found sustenance in a small dark corner with a shy nameplate that said, "Literature." But it was only a mirage. There were a measly fifteen books; all with orange casing; all grossly overpriced despite the authors' expired copyrights.

"Did you find anything?" Kristi  asked.

"No."

"Well, are you sure? Why don't you just get something?"

"No, this is not what I want."

I found my bookstore on top of a staircase with exactly eighteen steps and a sign at the bottom of the staircase that read, in English, "You are 18 steps away from probably the best bookstore in Amman." It reminded me of a Ford advertisement recently that said, "Our quality is now equal with that of Toyota."

Probably the Best Bookstore in Amman hosted a large collection of literature from Hemingway, Tolstoy, Steinbeck, and Fitzgerald. I bought the unabridged version of Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo--the title because I hadn't read it since high school, and the version because I have eight hours a day to kill. 

I immediately began to devour The Count of Monte Cristo. I read about Fernand and Danglars' betrayal of Edmond Dantes as the United States threatened to veto Palestine's United Nations bid for statehood. As the stock market plummeted due to fears of a Greek default, I was thrown out of the Chateau d'If in a body bag and discovered the treasure behind the twentieth rock on the Island of Monte Cristo. As protestors occupied Wall Street and demanded changes to a currupt system, I took revenge against the corrupt prosecutor Villefort and his self-serving invocations of the law. And, finally, when the seemingly unimportant nation of Slovakia stood tall and made its voice heard against a new Greek bailout, I bouyed up the feeble, yet honest, Morrel family with my treasure. 

When my friends and I visit bookstores, I immediately set sail toward the vast sea of literature only to find myself alone in my skiff. As a friend once said when I tried to convince him to read War and Peace, "Why would I spend so much time reading about an event that didn't occur to characters that didn't exist?"

This is an excellent question. A novel is an investment of time that could be spent building a repretoire of business terminology or solidifying one's knowledge of C++ or the Middle East peace process. In this higly specialized, obscenely competetive society, what value does a piece of literature have if you cannot quote from its pages in a job interview, or use the information to rise in the company's ranks?

The above question reminds me of Villefort's paralyzed father, Noirtier. Confined to a wheelchair without the ability to move or speak, Noirtier's body is lifeless except for his bright, large eyes that burn with anger, droop with compassion, and shine with love. Noirtier cannot work or play; he can only think and feel. But his eyes have more power than the words or actions of the most powerful members of the household. His power comes from the depth of his feelings and his ability to feel them. 

I don't mean to downplay the importance of non-fiction. The knowledge of subjects such as history and economics are vital to our society because they provide lessons that guide us in our actions. But it's feelings like compassion, love, vengfulness, and hate that separate us from our primate ancestors. Non-fiction teaches mankind how to think and do. Fiction teaches us how to feel. 

Fiction is not about made-up characters; fiction is about made-up ideas with characters and plot lines superimposed on top. This requires the reader to dig and reflect on the novel's themes more so than the straight-forward way non-fiction disburses information. We must attack a novel with the weapons the Russian General Kutuzov used to attack Napoleon: patience and time. We must fill the bathtub with the author's words and soak in them.

I learned from my wife that precious jewels of wisdom are not easy to come by or cheap to purchase. As I read novels, sometimes a passage will burrow into my soul and grow until it bursts in a desire to share it. One particular night, near the end of War and Peace, I read these words about Pierre that changed my life:

Pierre's insanity consisted in the fact that he did not wait, as before, for personal reasons, which he called people's merits, in order to love them, but love overflowed his heart, and, loving people without reason, he discovered the unquestionable reasons for which it was worth loving them.

I interrupted my wife's work in my excitement to read her this passage. When I finished, I looked up to see if it touched her heart like it did mine. She just smiled and said, "That's wonderful. Who is Pierre?"

She then kindly explained to me that the passage does not mean to her what it did to me, because she didn't know Pierre. I realized that this quote would mean nothing to me as well if I had not suffered, rejoiced, and matured with Pierre over three months of late nights and bloodshot eyes. I received this revelation only after I proved my devotion. 

Devotion to what? Perhaps devotion to the belief that there is more to life than what the news leads us to believe. I don't read novels to escape life. I read novels to peek at life from the platform of God. Twelve-hundred pages and four months to catch a glimpse of the infinite is worth the price. 

I read fiction because I hope to see life through Noirtier's eyes, full of passion and color that transcends the monotony of my job applications and my bank account. Otherwise, I would be doomed to look through the lifeless, billboard eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg at the charred remains of autoshops and railroad tracks that are covered in ashes and lead to nowhere.