10 Book Pairings to Expand the Way You Think
A reading list that bridges literary breadth with theoretical depth to create a more enriching learning experience.
Why do you read? This is a question I have asked myself countless times throughout the ups and downs of my reading journey—and one I believe every single reader should ask themselves. As the years go by, my answer to this question is becoming clearer and clearer, as if my eyes were slowly but surely coming into focus. I read because I have an aching and insatiable need to attempt to decipher the reality of our existence. I have always asked too many questions that don’t really have one objective answer, but through books, I can find ways to try to construct and deconstruct my current understanding of reality.
Last year, I made it a point to become a more diverse reader, as I had noticed myself getting too comfortable in my beloved literary fiction, so I immersed myself in non-fiction works more than I ever had before—everything from philosophy, to critical theory, psychology, memoirs, and even science. One fascinating thing I noticed as I read these is that I began to connect them with what I considered their literary counterparts. By book pairing, I found that a much more enriching and meaningful reading experience could be had. Not only does theory come to life through the emotional bonds we create with certain stories, but our critical thinking and retention skills are strengthened as we apply frameworks through pattern recognition.
In this month’s installment of Further Readings, I’ve curated a list blending books I’ve read together, books that prompted me to grab their companions, and ones I’m currently reading—or about to read and reread very soon. These have been carefully chosen to create a more profound understanding of a wide array of topics, not only to create a more meaningful reading experience, but to internalize frameworks that can guide us in our every day lives.
The concepts and themes of the books you’ll find below are very broad, but this is how I’ve chosen to categorize the pairings in this list:
Gaze as Reality
Geometry of Desire
Sovereignty of Race & Womanhood
Queer Loss & Resilience
Architecture of Memory
The Bounds of Logic
Spectator Ethics
Construction of Myth
Gender as Performance
Absurdity of Existence
Given that there’s no media roundup today, make sure to check out the last installment of Things To Do Instead of Doomscrolling over on Perfectly Imperfect. This one is titled Sources of Inspiration where I share a few places and ways in which I’ve found inspiration lately in a moment where it’s been particularly hard to find it :)
1. Gaze as Reality
Ways of Seeing by John Berger is a collection of seven essays based on the 1972 BBC series, three of which are entirely pictorial. Each essay examines a different aspect surrounding how we view art, a few of which examine how the male gaze influences the societal perception of women.
The Tunnel by Ernesto Sabato is a dark psychological novel set in Argentina, where deranged painter Juan Pablo Castel narrates the events that led to him murdering of the only woman he felt understood by.
I found this pairing particularly interesting to understand how perception and the male gaze in particular transcends internal biases and translates into real-life—often violent—consequences for both men and women. In The Tunnel, the main character is a painter and historian whose idealized version of a woman leads to total destruction when she doesn’t live up to his internal fantasy. When understood alongside Berger’s essays on the influence of patriarchal structures in the depictions of women in media, we observe the gap between perception and truth.
2. Geometry of Desire
Eros the Bittersweet by Anne Carson is an exceptionally thorough and lyrical exploration of desire, weaving together literary criticism, philosophy, and the semantics of ancient Greek poetry and other relevant texts.
Simple Passion by Annie Ernaux is a memoir documenting a two-year affair with a married man. It is a story about obsession and identity and how these interact with desire in a way that can seem to distort time and space.
These are two of my absolute favorite books I read last year, and they have been foundational for my understanding of the power of eros as a driver of creation and connection. These books examine how the triangulation of desire that happens between the lover, the beloved, and the space between them creates a form of lack that defines experience. Through Ernaux’s raw and intimate account, we can see how this comes into play in real life, illustrating Carson’s theory that desire is most powerful when it remains unfulfilled.
