I finally understood what Anton Ego meant when he said, “In the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism deeming it so.”

I consider myself to be an extremely harsh critic, usually to the detriment of my own enjoyment. So, I understand what it feels like. I know how easy it is to dismiss someone’s life’s work based on literary criterion.There’s this little series out there, I’m sure everyone has heard of, called “The Wheel of Time.” I have had quite the turbulent relationship with this series. I unabashedly used to talk down the series whenever I got the chance. I hated everything about it, always feeling bewildered with the amount of praise it would receive. I still came back to it, though, always likening it in my mind to a morbid curiosity in exploring bad writing than any actual affectation to the story. But then it hit home. I realised something. I kept coming back to this series whenever I felt depressed or frustrated in other aspects of life. Subconsciously, I would pick it up, and afterwards, feel just a little bit better. Life’s problems didn’t seem as daunting as they had before.It was this inexplicable and bucolic charm, that no matter how much I tried to downplay the series’s issues and weaknesses, would always find a way to help me when I felt down.I have come to understand that the real strength of a book doesn’t lie in its literary merit – even though I still enjoy those books more in terms of the actual reading – but in the feelings it elicits for the reader. That is why we can all have such different experiences with different books. via /r/books https://ift.tt/3jCZNmJ