i'm awfully backward when it comes to reading material. i can tell you the titles of the current 'hip' books you ought to be reading. i can tell you which books are crap and which books are prolly just a passing fad. i can tell you which chick lit ought to be considered as gay lit. i can even tell you which books are gay lit just by looking at the spine of the book (a useful ability to have when you're at Borders, cos it can get you laid). but the only thing that i can't seem to do is to complete reading a book.

i always seem to have a million and one other things to do and non of them are work-related at all. a date with my Playstation. a fling with my Nintendo DS. reading of the day's papers. gym. running. and not forgetting a quick browse through Newsweek and Time. but never enough time to read something else intellectual.

and it doesn't help that i'm an awful spendthrift. i have a tendency to buy loads of fabulous fiction from Borders and Times. but most of the TIMES, i don't even BORDER to complete these books at all (fact: people who don't complete books generally have a poor sense of humour, but still... HUR HUR HUR!). which is why the entire concept of libraries and borrowing is a much economical method for me to pursue some form of literature.

so it was with some joy that i stumbled upon somebody's copy of TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE on (ironically) the previous Tuesday. to tell the truth, i've actually been avoiding the book ever since it was published. Tuesdays With Morrie is so mainstream. it's one of those books that the cheena-piang people always use as a claim that they read books and enjoy English literature (other than 8 Days and FHM). i have seen countless cheena peeps using TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE and FIVE PEOPLE YOU MEET IN HEAVEN for 'favourite books' in their Friendster profiles. it's no wonder that Tuesdays and Five People are two books that have been hogging the best-seller list in our local newspapers for way too long a time.

it seems to indicate that singaporeans are just not very adventurous when it comes to books. whatever's on the POPULAR Top 10 Best-sellers will always remain that way. Why? because Singaporeans who go to Popular bookstore only want to purchase POPULAR books (refer to above point about people who don't complete books). it's like they're afraid of buying a book that sucks. or something that they cannot enjoy or understand. and it doesn't help that books are pretty expensive as well. a standard fiction novel can set you back by $18.99. a hardcover might push the prices to $30-$50. it's very costly for something that most people use once only. compared to CDs and DVDs.

come to think of it, it's exactly reasons like these that Dan Brown books can remain at the Top 10 Fiction list in Singapore for like weeks on end. the movie has already been released, the DVD is out, a million and one debates have been made about the legitimacy of Mary and all the meoribilia has already been auctioned off on E-bay. yet it stil refuses to budge from the top of the charts.

ok so i have to shamefully admit that i read almost half of the local best-sellers list as well. things like Freakonomics and The Curious Incident of The Dog At Midnight (or whatever the super long title was). and if you ask me, they were actually rather blah. popular reading material. but nothing that inspires you at all.

and with a debate now on whether we should have the natives to come teach us how to speak, it's not really helping the situation. few english teachers i know of actually read books. and even if they read, they reach for the mainstream ones. why? because they will CONFIRM be enjoyable reads. and they simply do not have the time to try new things. reading HAS to be enjoyable. not reading IS enjoyable. and yes, enough of the (branded)JC debator's tone of arguing.

we ought to get them ang mos to come and intro us a few good books. perhaps then the singaporeans will get some sense of what a GOOD book is. some Singaporeans think that J.K. Rowling writes really good books and ought to win a Pulitzer. appalling, i say. but ok lah, good in a summer blockbuster kinda way. but not good and inspiring in an Almodovar movie kinda way.

thus, we should be bringing on the natives, the brits, the good english teachers and professors. and perhaps in a decade's time, they'll all been stricken with a life-threatening disease. then we can all harrass them for good literature weekly..... on a TUESDAY.

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