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A review by miffybooks
The Book of Delights: Essays by Ross Gay
5.0
when benny first gave me this book, he told me i would love it and from the premise alone, i could immediately see why. writing a mini-essay every day about a small delight experienced is such a genius idea for a book, and one that ive even attempted to do (in much smaller forms) in the past.
so, with high expectations and unnecessarily critical eyes, i was a little disappointed halfway through the book. i loved the idea behind each of the essays still, but Gay’s voice felt like too much of a puzzle that kept me from really appreciating what he was writing about. i was too bothered by the long run-on sentences, the constant commas and his barrage of flowery language.
and then, some sort of realization crept up on me, that maybe, i take reading a little too seriously, and maybe not every book and every author has to follow the same rules. and as much as ive cherised my education from the SOTA Creative Writing department, i think i have to admit that its conditioned me to often seperate the artist’s craft techniques from the artist themself (especially when i dont have a close relationship with the author), making me look at other people’s writing as more of an objective checklist of Skill and Well Implemented Literary Devices rather than a genuine expression of their emotions. and that is NOT!! something that should be done with this book.
once i realized this, i had a second, accompanying realization: that ive never resonated with the spirit of an author and of a book more than ross gay and the book of delights. of COURSE hes going to write long run-on sentences about things hes excited about. i mean, have you ever HEARD me talk about a movie i love or a friend i love or a song i love?? i could talk about these things FOREVER and why wouldn’t i? gay feels the same way (i think!) and similarly refuses to let punctuation ruin the pureness of his delights. and the way he talks about big things like close friends and little things like small bits of shadows, theres so much pureness and so much subtle but obvious kindness that i really wouldn’t want him to express any other way.
this is a book and an author that i really want to take so many lessons from. i feel embarassed about being so stuck-up about it initially, but also really grateful that it helped me take a step back and work on taking reading less seriously. beautiful beautiful book. thank you for giving this to me benny. i love you a lot!
so, with high expectations and unnecessarily critical eyes, i was a little disappointed halfway through the book. i loved the idea behind each of the essays still, but Gay’s voice felt like too much of a puzzle that kept me from really appreciating what he was writing about. i was too bothered by the long run-on sentences, the constant commas and his barrage of flowery language.
and then, some sort of realization crept up on me, that maybe, i take reading a little too seriously, and maybe not every book and every author has to follow the same rules. and as much as ive cherised my education from the SOTA Creative Writing department, i think i have to admit that its conditioned me to often seperate the artist’s craft techniques from the artist themself (especially when i dont have a close relationship with the author), making me look at other people’s writing as more of an objective checklist of Skill and Well Implemented Literary Devices rather than a genuine expression of their emotions. and that is NOT!! something that should be done with this book.
once i realized this, i had a second, accompanying realization: that ive never resonated with the spirit of an author and of a book more than ross gay and the book of delights. of COURSE hes going to write long run-on sentences about things hes excited about. i mean, have you ever HEARD me talk about a movie i love or a friend i love or a song i love?? i could talk about these things FOREVER and why wouldn’t i? gay feels the same way (i think!) and similarly refuses to let punctuation ruin the pureness of his delights. and the way he talks about big things like close friends and little things like small bits of shadows, theres so much pureness and so much subtle but obvious kindness that i really wouldn’t want him to express any other way.
this is a book and an author that i really want to take so many lessons from. i feel embarassed about being so stuck-up about it initially, but also really grateful that it helped me take a step back and work on taking reading less seriously. beautiful beautiful book. thank you for giving this to me benny. i love you a lot!