prose enthusiast, poetry cynic
on my evolving reading habits and why i've grown to love long form prose and unknowingly nurtured a strange distaste for poetry
every so often, i have this urge to clean out my bookshelf, to rid my space of the skins i’ve shed within the bounds of book covers. through time, i’ve discovered that i do not let go of non-fiction books as easily as i let go of fiction; i suppose the worldly truths i’ve discovered in non-fiction are more insightful to me than the truths that no longer reflect who i am.
the evolution of my literary preferences
my reading habits have significantly changed since my escapist yearnings fueled my fantasy-indulging habits of reading foundational young adult literature. like many readers in my generation who read the middle and high school young adult classics1, my reading habits waned in undergrad, replacing fantastical escapes with a stark reflection of reality in academic articles and mind-numbing passages from textbooks that cost an arm and a leg.
after graduating, i’ve had the pleasure of expanding my tastes through an exploration of genres, authors, and mediums. i read audio and e-books, i have go-to authors that i will always purchase, read and love, i love fiction that bends genres, and i love reading literary non-fiction or theory that i don’t always completely understand. i primarily borrow books from the library or find ways to access ebooks and audiobooks online and i only purchase a book either once i’ve read it and loved it, when i trust that i will use it as a resource in the future2, or when i know the author has never failed to disappoint me. this system has allowed me to read loads of fiction without having to spend a single penny, in fact i own under a hundred books, more than half of which are non-fiction works that i often refer to, or re-read passages from.
my goal this year was to combat the gamification of reading by reading less than one hundred books, reading outside any influences3 , and following my instincts instead, like i used to as a twelve year old excitedly looking for new reads on the shelves in the young adult section at the library. in the past five years, i’ve read about five hundred books, the majority of which included many fictional books that didn’t leave a lasting impact, i just read them for the sake of reading them and being ‘in’ on the hype. after leaving social media, i don’t really experience that feeling of reading for the sake of reading anymore and immediately stop reading a book that i know i’m not wholeheartedly enjoying. this process has reshaped my reading habits, i’ve let go of many novels i once cared for deeply, and just recently, i let go of the poetry collections that i hadn’t connected with for almost a decade.
from verse to worse
my distaste for poetry emerged about seven years ago, i could not read through a poetry collection without a viscerally repulsive reaction. i am drawn to prose instead, paragraphs and sentences and whole books that immerse you in a narrative that carries you to your truths. as a recovered spoken word poet4, perhaps there is a part of me i reject in the poetry i read. the books i let go of had highlighted stanzas, dog-eared pages, exclamation marks, and aggressive underlines – all markings of my young self who related to hollow interpretations of my culture neatly packed into four sentences. at the time, i thought this was a remarkable feat and found myself trying to find space in the poetry scene, going to spoken word performances, writing poetry in my notebook on my commute home and naturally, posting my work on instagram.
i hold an ambivalence towards spoken word poetry, a medium of literature that thrives in performance, and formulaic, often clichéd prose that offers nothing of substance–it speaks at rather than about the subject. my ambivalence comes from the recognition that this style of poetry is very palatable for a generic audience and by talking about taboo topics, at least there is some sense of awareness being raised. not to mention, it’s a great way to engage folks with shorter attention spans. on the other hand however, this style of poetry tends to prioritize style over substance, often caricaturing personal experiences simply to evoke reactions. although social media helped platform poetry and make it more accessible, many pieces don’t provide anything of substance and bleed of inauthenticity5. it feels like this form of poetry has become a self-indulgent way of performing for an audience online and in the process, it has diluted any meaningful, authentic, and substantial prose you could spend time with.
longer and enduring prose is more appealing to me now, there are books i haven’t read in years on my shelf but i will flip to the dog-eared pages and annotated passages and re-read them just so they can linger in my mind throughout the week. prose holds layers, it engages your critical thinking skills and points to complex social, emotional, political ideas. my favourite author, hanif abdurraqib, wrote poetry and i wasn’t really drawn to it, but the literary non-fiction he writes lives with me for so much longer. he writes about baldness in such a spiritually and emotionally elevated way through longer prose that i don’t think his poetry could have expressed. in reading more literature and prosaic non-fiction works, even here on substack, i find myself more drawn to the language, the somewhat unstructured structure of the work, and the profound impact it leaves on me.
i recognize, of course, that mediums and genres can change over time6, so i might revisit traditional poetry in the future, and i like to keep an open mind when it comes to my reading habits. i find that what i consciously or subconsciously reach for tells me a lot about what headspace i’m in, and what i yearn for in my life. i’m starting grad school in the fall and i’m intrigued to see how my reading habits change (or stagnate) with this life change.
percy jackson, i am number four, the fault in our stars, divergent, and of course, the hunger games, just to name a few
usually only applies to non-fiction, and when i want to physically annotate and interact with the text in the margins.
social media, library marketing, bookstore promotions
there is nothing wrong inherently with writing spoken word poetry or identifying as a poet, i just find the medium very limiting now.
i am also critiquing my partaking in all this, when i wrote with an audience and social media likes in mind, my writing became more performative and anxiety inducting. this is in part why i am practicing my writing skills on substack, to leave my writing here, unedited, unpolished, yet whole.
as we’ve seen with the emergence of so-called romantasy