The Joy of Modern-Day Reading

I’m currently reading two books: Nexus by Harari and Meditation For Mortals by Burkeman. I’m enjoying both. They help me figure out how to live my life.

I first came across Harari not because of his book Sapiens but because Harari was a serious meditation practitioner. And when I learned about his book, I didn’t actually read it. Instead, I watched a series of videos where he discusses the ideas in Sapiens on YouTube. These were old videos where he spoke directly to the camera, almost like a professor lecturing a class of students.

His ideas and approach to life made an impact on me. I wanted to be like him- a clear and calm thinker and historian. He was always eloquent, coherent, nuanced, and calm, and his ideas left a mark on me for good.

I cannot remember how I came across Burkeman. I read his book “The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking” back in 2019. In 2021, I listened to him promoting his book Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals in a podcast interview with Ryan Holiday on ‘The Daily Stoic’. As a productivity junkie, I was intrigued by the title. Ironically, the book turned out to be an argument against productivity. He was eloquent, coherent, nuanced, and calm in his speech, and I found myself mesmerised by him and his ideas. I bought his book immediately and his ideas left a mark on me for good. (To get an idea of what the key points are in his book, take a look at this.)

Their newest books continue their coherence and eloquence. Through their works, I am indulging myself in a calmer reality to the otherwise chaotic and hopeless perceived reality. Harari’s Nexus isn’t necessarily reassuring; it’s a historical ledger of how humanity has repeatedly tangled itself in a web of information, creating the chaos we find ourselves in. Burkeman’s book forces us to confront the undeniable fact of mortality, the finiteness of opportunities in life, and the unproductive compromises we too often make.

One great aspect of modern reading is the access we now have to authors through podcast interviews and YouTube videos. This has made reading a lot more enjoyable.

Before podcasts and YouTube, authors were more enigmatic. While I could get a sense of an author’s personality from their writing and from rare magazine or newspaper interviews, my impression was always vague. I remember when I first read Jared Diamond’s book, I pictured him as an imposing white man with a full head of sleek, lustrous hair. He sounded strong and assertive. In reality, though–thanks to YouTube–I discovered he is actually a modest-looking man with thin hair, a chinstrap beard, and one of those strange downward-slanting smiles that can look like a frown. He looked nothing like I imagined, and it made me question the marks his books had left on me, as though the hue around his words had shifted.

So, as I am reading Harari and Burkemen’s newest books, I am consuming everything I can find about them on podcasts and YouTube. I learned from Harari’s chats with Sam Harris about how his extended silent meditation retreats influenced his thinking. Burkeman’s subtle British humility and sense of irony came through loudly and clearly when he talked to Ryan Holiday. Everything I watched and heard about them added context and colour to their text. Everything I’ve learned about them made their text bigger, fuller, better.

Though some purists might argue against “reading” this way fiercely, I think the opportunity to “read” like this is a tremendous blessing.


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