I’ve had this theory for a while about why we would choose to read a particular work of fiction. I was discussing it last night with someone I work with, and he seemed to not disagree, so I shall expand on that theory here: I believe that there’s two reasons we read what we read: either it’s i) a well-written work or ii) it has an interesting story. Obviously these aren’t mutually exclusive criteria and a work can be both or neither, but I think that, to an extent, one can compensate for the other, although there’s a minimum level of each anyone would be willing to accept.

Here’s a bar chart I made illustrating the point, although the y-scale is comprised of competely meaningless arbitrary numbers:

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“Repetitions and lack of grammatical complexity both help to make Homer a swift, lively, vivid and easy read” – that is from Peter Jones’ introduction to the Penguin Classics edition of The Odyssey and I completely agree with that statement. I am often given the impression that The Odyssey is some long and arcane ancient text occupying a level well beyond the difficult language of Shakespeare, and just a little beyond Joyce’s Ulysses and Tolstoy’s War and Peace in terms of insurmountability: “You read the Odyssey?!” (with awed gasping). But really, it’s no more complex than, say, Philip Pullman’s excellent His Dark Materials trilogy; books primarily written for young teenagers. (more…)