Post Book Depression
Okay, so now I'm suffering from post book depression.
I just mentioned this to a friend and he thought it must have been a sad story I'd been reading. But it isn't that at all.
The thing is, now I have to come back to the real world for a bit. While I'm reading a book, I become immersed, I kind of pretend that it is the real world, and I just have to visit the real real world occasionally in between the chapters. You know, just to eat, sleep, work, that sort of thing. But once the book ends - hell, what can I do? I get a bit down.
So, anyway, I was reading Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (like everyone else on the planet, eh?). Actually I finished it about a week after publication, but I have the added bonus of being able to read it again, aloud, and share the story, which I have really enjoyed and which has allowed my suspension of disbelief to run a bit longer.
But now it is finished. I don't think I can sustain the feeling of immersion in the world until the last book is published, what with JKR not even having started writing it yet. So now I have to live in a world without magic, without ridiculous amounts of danger and bravery, without Hermione Granger, for years. Back to the mundane.
(An aside - I accused a friend yeasterday of fancying Hermione. I should come clean - I fancy Hermione - in a 'if I was 13 again' sort of way, you understand? Or maybe I'd just like to be Hermione - I loved the bit in the book where she gets 9 'Outstandings' and an 'Exceeds Expectations' in her exams and she's disappointed. That actually happened to me when I was her age. 9 As and a B at GCSE - and I was disappointed. Luckily we both had people to point out our idiocy).
So what was I saying? Ah yes, a world without magic. But wait! What is this artifact I see before me? A tiny device, smaller than my hand, and yet with it I can speak to my mother in law in Tokyo! Surely this is magical... just because I (think I) understand how it works doesn't make it less magical, I'm sure Professor McGonagall understands Transfiguration.
It is interesting that humans have the ability to see anything that has been around for more than about 5 minutes as mundane. Mobile phones hardly existed 10 years ago when I was at university - certainly I didn't know anyone with one. Nowadays not carrying one is considered unusual. The internet is another case in point. Google is only 7 years old but the name is now a verb in the english language (and probably several others).
So maybe, instead of moping about, wishing books lasted forever, I should just try and see the magic that surrounds me all the time. And as for bravery and danger, the physical variety I can live without (lets face it, you might not live with, might you?), but maybe, just maybe, I should go out on a limb, stick up for something I believe in, and build that windfarm. Power from the air? That's magic...
I just mentioned this to a friend and he thought it must have been a sad story I'd been reading. But it isn't that at all.
The thing is, now I have to come back to the real world for a bit. While I'm reading a book, I become immersed, I kind of pretend that it is the real world, and I just have to visit the real real world occasionally in between the chapters. You know, just to eat, sleep, work, that sort of thing. But once the book ends - hell, what can I do? I get a bit down.
So, anyway, I was reading Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (like everyone else on the planet, eh?). Actually I finished it about a week after publication, but I have the added bonus of being able to read it again, aloud, and share the story, which I have really enjoyed and which has allowed my suspension of disbelief to run a bit longer.
But now it is finished. I don't think I can sustain the feeling of immersion in the world until the last book is published, what with JKR not even having started writing it yet. So now I have to live in a world without magic, without ridiculous amounts of danger and bravery, without Hermione Granger, for years. Back to the mundane.
(An aside - I accused a friend yeasterday of fancying Hermione. I should come clean - I fancy Hermione - in a 'if I was 13 again' sort of way, you understand? Or maybe I'd just like to be Hermione - I loved the bit in the book where she gets 9 'Outstandings' and an 'Exceeds Expectations' in her exams and she's disappointed. That actually happened to me when I was her age. 9 As and a B at GCSE - and I was disappointed. Luckily we both had people to point out our idiocy).
So what was I saying? Ah yes, a world without magic. But wait! What is this artifact I see before me? A tiny device, smaller than my hand, and yet with it I can speak to my mother in law in Tokyo! Surely this is magical... just because I (think I) understand how it works doesn't make it less magical, I'm sure Professor McGonagall understands Transfiguration.
It is interesting that humans have the ability to see anything that has been around for more than about 5 minutes as mundane. Mobile phones hardly existed 10 years ago when I was at university - certainly I didn't know anyone with one. Nowadays not carrying one is considered unusual. The internet is another case in point. Google is only 7 years old but the name is now a verb in the english language (and probably several others).
So maybe, instead of moping about, wishing books lasted forever, I should just try and see the magic that surrounds me all the time. And as for bravery and danger, the physical variety I can live without (lets face it, you might not live with, might you?), but maybe, just maybe, I should go out on a limb, stick up for something I believe in, and build that windfarm. Power from the air? That's magic...
posted by Tony @ 22:59
2 Comments:
At 12:12 am,
Anonymous said…
You should think about it another way. When I finish a book yes I'm always a bit sad too, but then there is the exictment of choosing the next book the next portal to another world. Choosing which sort of world, which adventure I want to take next. Its not the end its simple the beginning. You sound like you have read the last book in existance. And okey everytime you choose a book you hope its going to be what you looking for and can't always be the book of your dreams but every new book is a new experience and a new take on things. Go out and explore!
At 12:35 am,
RobZed said…
Whilst I agree generally with Tony about finishing a book - I have to wonder whether some books leave you with multiple levels of sadness - or perhaps you can be glad for finishing a book - even if it is not terrible?
I also agree that we take a lot for granted and miss the awe and magic of it all. From the opposite angle I think we cannot go around awestruck about everything. Fire, clothes, houses are all fantastic technologies. But things that are mundane because they are part of the fabric of our world - just as mobile phones now are. And magic is only any good in films and books. In the real world it becomes part of the way the world works - i.e. studied by science. Arthur C Clark said: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistingishable from Magic". But is not fire, lightning and anything electronic magical on some level to most people?
Oh, and yes, Hermione rocks.
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