52 Books in a year.
Table of Contents
52 Books in a year, introduction.
Welcome back, today I'm gonna talk about one more thing that I got quite involved since I am bored and I can't go anywhere because it's too damn cold outside. I assume that you've read the title, and if you didn't, I would like to remind you that's how reading works, and you should give it a try (as if I know anything about that, lol).
One thing that is quite obvious is we ain't in the start of the year and this "challenge" is hard because you should 1 book per week, and for all of the badly-educated Americans here (no mom, I'm not racist), one year equals to 52 weeks, give or take.
I am just starting this journey and we are 9 1/2 deep into the year. So yes, this means that I am about 10 books behind the schedule, silly me.
But why exactly am I doing this?
Because, well, you see I figured out that my active English vocabulary is not great. Even though I score C1/C2 on tests, I constantly fail at writing sections in which I have no trust in myself to even write about a simple topic. And I also thought that I don't read enough. Yes, I read in languages I learn but they're generally not really great in terms of actual reading, and yet on that basis I don't read enough in languages I am fluent at. Besides, I want to learn some fancy and niche vocabulary because I always see some Reddit users online posting their perfect 160/160 DET or 9 band IELTS result and using some rigorously hard to see words like benevolent or something I don't even know, but I envy them a lot.
One more big reason is, next year, I am starting a programme called IBDP, and I will take (if my understandings are correct) the hardest English class possible. Should read, should write.
Also I want to take an exam called CPE, which is for English and this 52 books/year would be a super thing for my proficiency.
Rules
I have two main rules:
- A book should be over 400 pages. If I read a book that is lower than that, I should read another book to sum it up to 400 pages.
- Book should be at my level, for English, that would be C2, which points me to books like "Crime and Punishment", "Pride and Prejudice" et cetera.
And one side rule:
- I should focus on "native novels", which means I will try to read novels and books mainly written in British English.
But these are not the only things I should do with this project. I will also do:
- Write at least 500 words about pages I've read or if I don't want to write about them, write at least 750 words about another thing.
- If I chose to write 750+ words that day, I will post it to my blog.
How am I going to catch up to the original plan?
Well, I am going to try as much as I can and as hard as I can, but my main purpose here is not reading books but understanding the meanings behind them, learning from them and digesting them, and this definitely is a slow process. That being said, I will read twice the amount each day until I catch up, disregarding my main goal that I mentioned before because I am a trustworthy man just like that.
What books will I read? Do I have a reading list?
For now, I will read books that I already had and never opened or finished. That includes Crime & Punishment, Pride & Prejudice and Animal Farm, all of which I find level-appropriate. But, as I have said above, my intention is to hit multiple birds with one stone, so I will try to find books that are recommended to IBDP English Lang&Lit students, or some books that those students have to read, of course.
Remembering new words
As you may know, I am not a big fan of using Anki or other flashcard programs (like org-drill) at higher levels, so I will just look the words up from the dictionary and move on with my life. At least I plan to do it like that.
Some part of my brain keeps itching for making new sentence cards with Anki (or org-drill if I can set it up, and using it most likely will my solution if I start to read & take book notes with Emacs) because of how efficient that would be. So, we will see I guess.
Conclusion and closing ceremony
As always, I would like to thank you on the basis that I yap an unrequired amount. See ya next time.