Large Fierce Mammal

But that shouldn’t stop you from reading.

“I am a product […of] endless books. My father bought all the books he read and never got rid of any of them. There were books in the study, books in the drawing room, books in the cloakroom, books (two deep) in the great bookcase on the landing, books in a bedroom, books piled as high as my shoulder in the cistern attic, books of all kinds reflecting every transient stage of my parents’ interest, books readable and unreadable, books suitable for a child and books most emphatically not. Nothing was forbidden me. In the seemingly endless rainy afternoons I took volume after volume from the shelves. I had always the same certainty of finding a book that was new to me as a man who walks into a field has of finding a new blade of grass.” ~ C.S. Lewis

Mrs. LFM and I learned the love of books and reading in our early pre-school years, and whenever gifts are to be given or received, we both treasure a well selected book as a first choice. We keep a room dedicated as a Library, and our house somewhat resembles what C. S. Lewis described as his childhood reality. Notwithstanding that, we also have electronic options wherever we go. Our telephones contain so much storage that they permit loading on of any book you could ever want to read or refer to, as well as technical manuals pertaining to any work related issue we may be called upon to attack.The picture at the top of this page isn’t intended as a besmirchment of electronic reading devices. Rather, it’s a celebration of books. The love of them as objects deserving of love, and  by extension, the love of reading. I walk into a place where books dwell, like waiting portals to other realms and pathways to hidden – even forbidden – knowledge. I smell their subtle scent, delight in the feel of taking one in hand, and the whisper of its pages as they slip between my fingers. A sensuous thrill even before its author breaths a word to me.

A sadly increasing portion of the population have never learned to read for the sheer joy of it, and such people certainly can’t grasp why one not only might read for enjoyment, but why the same book might be re-read regularly. From this, I believe, has been spawned an estrangement from True Love, Friendship, and Community with Nature, and in this, I’ll again point to C. S. Lewis who referred to revisiting beloved stories as akin to spending time with old and dear Friends. He said a lot of things that point to the life lessons that can be absorbed from the gentle, and sometimes not so gentle, art of reading; among them:

“Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become.”

“Since it is so likely that (children) will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage. Otherwise you are making their destiny not brighter but darker.”

“Adventures are never fun while you’re having them.” ~ The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

“When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”

“My own eyes are not enough for me; I will see through those of others.”

And last for today, but most importantly:

“Child,’ said the Lion, ‘I am telling you your story, not hers. No one is told any story but their own.” ~ The Horse and His Boy