I think it’s more to do with your personality and preferences than anything else. You could have the same differences in appreciation and comprehension with most other things. Everyone’s a tiny bit different, and some gaps are larger than others. I cherish when I love things that others don’t get. It makes them feel more personal and special.

Yes, it's different tastes. You enjoy the book, so you find it easier to read than they do. It's probably not a difference in comprehension, it's a difference in motivation.

From a NYTimes review of the book: "Gravity's Rainbow is bonecrushingly dense, compulsively elaborate, silly, obscene, funny, tragic, pastoral, historical, philosophical, poetic, grindingly dull, inspired, horrific, cold, bloated, beached and blasted." In other words, it's not everyone's cup of tea. Do you really think that Pynchon was trying to write something that would be? I think this is part of being in a book club. You'll find that people have different tastes. I'm reading Blood Meridian with a book club. I hate it. I understand it, but I don't understand why it was written, why we are reading it, or why people think it's a classic. But other people love it. It's nothing to do with who is smarter than who. It's just our personal reaction to the book.

I've never met anyone who didn't find GR a challenge - i've read it twice. It would be a challenge to simply sum the novel up in a few sentences. This sounds like a you thing

Its just a matter of taste. You enjoy the book so you are motivated to continue reading it, others dont, and arent. I adore Thomas Manns The Magic Mountain, I personally consider it one of the best books ever written. Part of the way through there are philosophical discussions between the Jesuit and the Professor and some of these are both complex and wordy...Ive had to read through those parts 2 or 3 times to understand what they are putting forward. If I didnt love the book so much, Id likely have given up at that point, and I wouldnt blame anyone that did, love for the rest carried me through. So yes, just taste.

Probably taste. There's complex books that I just breeze through and simple books that I just cannot finish.

Finding something to enjoy about a book is key to reading it and digesting it.

>I really don’t mean this in a humblebrag or “toot my own horn” kind of way.

Cue the downvotes here, but how do you not mean it in this way? Like the entire point of the post just seems to be "Hey, everyone in my book club is struggling with a book, but I'm doing just fine. Does this mean I'm smarter than them?" If not to brag, what's the point of posting this? Like what information were you looking to get?

Pynchon's style and choices as a writer have never worked for me and I am a huge fan of some classics that other people hate. People appreciate different things in books. It doesn't necessarily make them bad readers.

Dont see why you'd get downvoted, you bring up a really good point

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Agreed. I really don’t understand why so many people get accused of humble brags when this is anonymous.

People can still enjoy having their ego stroked anonymously haha

Well, yeah, if you're gonna make a post bragging about something, trying to tell people "oh no, this isn't a brag" at the beginning isn't really gonna do much.

Reading comprehension isn’t really tested as a thing once you’re out of full time education, unless you have a learning disability. We test it explicitly for children up to 16, looking for it to match their chronological age, then to measure learning disabilities.

Sometimes instructions are tested for readability/ reading age. The US Navy did a lot of this work, originally. It needed “uneducated” enlisted men to be able to read the handbooks!

As an English graduate, and English teacher, I can reassure you, the difference is taste. I read Joyce’s Ulysses as a teen and didn’t notice any difficulties. I cannot get past Ch 3 of Tom Jones. It’s not difficulty; it’s taste.

Plan a presentation for your book club. See if you can show them the charm of Gravity’s Rainbow

"Do I disagree with my friends? Or am I just smarter than them? A God among men, if you will. Head and shoulders above the crowd. Just wondering."

Difficult? Not difficult? Who cares? 🤷🏼 I’ve read quite a few classics that while considered high brow, intellectual, difficult, whatever, I thought they were boring as hell but others found very moving.

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props for doing the research!

If it hasn't happened already, maybe your book club will choose a book which you find to be confusing and boring but which others enjoy. What would you think then? Would you worry about your level of "reading comprehension" or would you just say that it wasn't your cup of tea?

>We’ve read similarly difficult books so I’m a tad confused.

You answered your own question, so I'm not sure what the point of this post is. You're not confused--you're pretending to be confused to get a pat on the back for enjoying a "difficult" book.

You sound insufferable.

It’s art and art is always subjective. I hate Beloved. Others love it. Doesn’t mean I couldn’t understand the material or found it hard to read. I just didn’t connect with the art. Find someone else to chat with who has connected with Gravity’s Rainbow the way you have and let your book club end their suffering.

The Old Testament is very difficult for some people but it's not written in a very sophisticated style. It can feel very tedious at some points. I've read some people outright recommend avoiding the Tabernacle portion. I've heard of people describing Rothko as the two-color guy and people explaining that seeing it in person finally made it click for them. Just like movies, just like music. You've found some sort of connection with your book while everyone else has missed it. Why don't you try explaining your connection with your group?

I'll try:

Hey have you seen this missile? No? Welp here's some incest.

Well, if you are an adult and reading in your native language and don't have any kind of cognitive limitations I don't see why "reading comprehension" is even a topic. I have only ever heard that talked about when studying a foreign language and moving from lessons and textbooks to regular books.

And of course your mind wanders and you find a book "hard" if you don't actually like the story. Happened to me more and more with the basic thriller, which is why I took a break from the genre. And these are definitely not "hard" books.

Exactly. ESP the people who fill the need for internet validation

They may be rethinking whether they really want to spend their time reading “challenging” books. There is nothing wrong with reading for pleasure and not finishing books that feel like a chore to slog through.

What other books has your book club read?

Why does it matter to think, or clarify you’re superior to them in reading habits, preference or comprehension? That’s weird and superficial in a messed up way lol. Kind of the point of book clubs I think to ah e differing views and perceptions. To help each other understand or see things.

I comprehend things further than most people, and I don’t think of them as beneath me or even consider they have a smoother brain. You have a massive ego if that’s how you’re viewing it. People who don’t see as deeply as I do, enjoy hearing me explain the things they don’t pick up on. Or how I connect things, bc even if it’s not accurate, it’s a different view. It’s a perception. They like hearing it from that way, and it gets them thinking, and sometimes they pick up on something in a different way from it, or notice more I haven’t.

Worth noting, we’re able to talk like that because I don’t view them or myself, the way you are viewing your group, and self. I have a feeling you explaining stuff would come across varying kinds of condescending.

Right? So often people take it to somewhere like Reddit so they can just focus on the numbers in agreement and support.

My favourite thing to remind people, “ just because you have a lot in support, doesn’t mean you’re right or justified.”

The amount of people who say, “yeah okay!’ How can I be wrong if people agree with me?!”

Wtf hahaha this has chilled out my curiosity to try reading it a bit lol

Exactly.

I'm going to agree with the majority and say that it's just your personal taste Reading comprehension is kind of weird and different for everyone. I highly doubt a group of people in a literal book club have bad reading comprehension. It's more than one thing. Memory, language skills, focus, etc. For example. I read really fast, but my retention sucks unless I take notes. My friend is a slow reader, but remembers everything to a T. My friend has an amazing memory, but sucks at spelling. Lol I am amazing at spelling. But my memory is absolutely terrible. I for the life of me, also cannot comprehend a book if it just bores me.

Why do you hate blood meridian? Is it because it's too dark? I loved the book and thought it was really well written.

Violence, cheapness of human life, racism (which I understand was part of the culture then, but I don't like it in my ears or my eyes). I haven't finished it yet. Perhaps it will redeem itself somehow, but honestly, I just don't like all the violence even if it does.

I don't understand the question you wrote.

I think a large part of his work is to shed light on the darker side of reality. The wild west was a violent, racist, bloodbath. He has the same attitude in the road as well. For me, that's why I like him. He reminds you that those times were not fun, cowboy fairy tales. He reminds you that page turning adventures in reality would probably just high stakes and terrifying.

It's like the heavy contrast you see between a commercial for joining the Marines, filled with cool hero guys and pride vs an interview with an actual vet who has PTSD. So that's completely understandable. If you look past the shock factor, it really does have some beautiful writing though. Try and desensitize yourself to it a little and look past the gore.

Yeah, I'm reading it. But I have PTSD myself, so I'm already well aware of the darker side of reality. This is just not something I'm going to enjoy.

Ah, I'm sorry to hear that. Maybe you shouldn't read it. There's no reason to put yourself through that.

Different tastes most likely. When I was a kid, I went through books like water. Books about just about anything. If it got me out of my reality, I was happy to read about boy wizards, pioneer girls, sensual vampires, coming if age stories focused on math for some reason, fact compilations, science magazines, and history text books. Whatever I could put my hands on, I would read. My reading comprehension was always very strong.

It took me nearly a month to get through a YA novel last year. I was reading it so my nibling had someone to talk about it with. But I'm not a kid anymore, the writing felt... Vintage, and I just wasn't terribly into it. It was okay and by the end, I liked it well enough. It certainly wasn't hard to comprehend, but it took me forever in comparison to how I used to devour the written word. I sailed through a much more difficult text the week after that, and took a week to read a collection of PowerPoints on home ownership the week after that. I have to enjoy something to have the energy to devote to really plowing through material these days, otherwise, it does feel a little like pulling teeth.

Ah well, just one more week in the book club. I try to give things a chance, but I won't read any other McCarthy books in the future.

Right on. I don't have PTSD so I view the book differently. I like his work being dark because it reminds me to enjoy the peace I'm able to have currently. I hope you can find at least some enjoyment before you finish. I'm sorry that you're struggling with it. Peace be with you. Have a nice evening.

Why does it matter? Just read the books you enjoy and maybe some you find challenging, no need to compare yourself with others.