Yugan Sakthi: "To Carmen Maria Machado: An Author's Responsibility is a Reader's Choice"

An Author’s Responsibility is a Reader’s Choice

By Yugan Sakthi

Often times stories that other people—my friends, classmates, teachers, my aunt—adore are ones I can barely stomach, much less read all the way through. In grade school, for example, many of my friends kept telling me that the Hardy Boys series was the best they had ever read, but I became bored of it fast.

To answer the first part of Maria Carmen Machado’s question – what makes you pick up a book? I turn to my reading of fiction as early as I can remember. Apart from being read to by my parents, the first series I read of my own volition was Magic Tree House by Mary Pope Osborne. Starting with Dinosaurs Before Dark, I worked my way through their enthralling (at the time) adventures through time. To me, the captivating factor in these books was the sense of wonder and imagination I could get from reading them. They weren’t just books I read. They were books I thought about.

In school, I’d stare outside the window at the woods in our yard, wondering if one day a treehouse would appear there to whisk my away into the lands of Avalon, or 1940s Brooklyn, or the prehistoric ages. I hoped that I could just say a few words and the mundane everyday life of homework and afterschool piano lessons would change into a better world, one with magic and samurai and knights. 

It’s not a new idea; J.R.R. Tolkien mentions the three elements of fantasy as escape, recovery, and consolation. And in a way, Magic Tree House was all three to me.

Using Magic Tree House as a springboard, I dived into reading other stories. I found books in one of two ways: the first would be by its cover (you heard me right. If I thought the cover looked interesting, I’d read it), and the second was by recommendation, either by my friends, teachers, librarians, or anyone else. 

And to this day, those two remain the two primary ways I start reading a book: either by recommendation, or by its cover (and, of course, the back-cover synopsis). I have never been one to care about reviews, whether they be online or in magazines. Reading about reading was never my style, so my selection in books still is about gut feeling, and that’s it.

Once I pick up the book, though, it’s a very different story. I rarely, if ever, don’t finish a book, even if it is like chewing through a wet towel. That aforementioned idea of capturing not just my attention, but also my thinking, is my answer to the second part of Machado’s question: what’s the worst mistake an author could do? If the book I’m reading doesn’t make me think about it intensely outside of reading it, then to me the author has committed the equivalent of literary homicide. 

And that doesn’t mean the story needs to have intricate subplots or puzzling story structure. A simple narration of events is sometimes my favorite story, if the underlying themes and messages are truly impactful. George Orwell’s 1984 is a prime example of this. Although quite well-written, the book itself is pretty straightforward, and narrates through the eyes of Winston Smith a story of thought control, “socialism,” and love.

Yet it is a book that I still think about to this day, a year and a half after reading it. The implications that book had on society—the dire consequences it foretold of increasing government power—were enormous, and I could spend days thinking about how those consequences might play out in our own society. 

On the other hand is the novel The Fault in our Stars by John Green, widely acclaimed to be a gripping tale of love and death, yet which to me was little more than well-written story that made me smile or frown every 50 or so pages. To me, there wasn’t much to think about, and even though Green was a powerful writer, his story just didn’t seem to have an impact on me.

But in the end, I’m a fan of most books that I read. As bad as one may be, I always make sure to finish, if for nothing but to learn for myself what kinds of books I don’t like. As I keep hunting for more material to read, I know I’ll broaden my horizons and be a little better at choosing—and judging—stories.