I just listened to some good classics on some of my long arduous road trips here in Central Kalimantan. First, it is obviously so much quicker to listen to books than reading them page by page. Yeah, you don't get the same depth, but you are guarenteed to get at least the big idea and the nuances of the thinkings and contents inside. Besides, there are a lot of times when I read a book cover to cover and still don't "get" it until months or even years later. Second, one of the things that I (love and then) hate in my current life is the long hours of riding in a car on roads with dirt surfaces. So listening to an interesting reading takes me away a little bit from the mind numbing aspect of the trip and shortens the overall travel time.
And just now, I was listening to Aristotle's Poetics. Did you know that it is the most boring interesting thing in the world. Yes it is. No wonder I was never able to finish the book even the first few chapters. Why did I try the audio version then? You know as design student you always heard about that book and the title "Poetics" tossed around in academic converstions but never really required as a reading in class. And the first few chapters on "the art of imitation" are quite intriguing for us who were just learning to "imitate". And then, the next few chapters on Greek plays are said to be the required reading for movie-making students or whoever is interested in it. I was at that time.
After reading (or listening) to it, it is indeed a difficult read, not really something for lay people like me. And the writer of the preface also convinces me to question the authority of the book in relation to Aristotle. Yes, Mr. Aristotle is a huge name and he might be called the great philosopher or logician but, I realize until now that he is never called the great poet.
He is a history but there are so much history before him on the subject. That notion of periods might be loss to us lay people in the modern time in studying Aristotle. In other words, just because he is Aristotle, doesn't mean that everything he says is as great.
Lastly, the aural experience I got from Poetics is parellel to the visual's in my road trip. It is an intertwined experience of a journey through banalities of repetitive elements that are interspersed with moments of supreme beauty of vast landscapes. In a less perverted sentence: seeing in the Kalimantan road trip is the same cognitive experience as listening to Poetics.
Oh well, that's what I am doing (listening to audiobooks) these days to revive some of my dying neurons in long road trips. Not a bad idea.