Wait, what? On lying? Lying about what? Well why don’t I just tell you? On lying about what you have and have not read. I saw another blogger post about this recently and then I read a few articles from major publications. There seems to be a number of people who lie about having read certain books.
I may be mistaken, but I think the survey was taken in England. And I also think the books people lie about reading are mostly classics.
This whole thing got me thinking. First, I see no point in saying I’ve read any book I haven’t. And second, which book(s) would I lie about reading? If I were such a person. Hmmmm. I think I’d lie about reading a book if I’d already seen the movie. But I can’t imagine lying about reading some classic I know nothing about. Imagine the conversation.
“Have you read Pride and Prejudice?”
“Yeah! It’s one of my favorites!”
“Oooh. Who’s your favorite character?”
*crickets*
And there’s really no reason to experience this. I know people talk about books they haven’t read, and that’s fine. But saying you’ve read something you haven’t is just weird. And dumb.
Have you ever told someone you’d read a book you actually hadn’t? Which book was it you little liar, you? 😂
Johnny Reads 
Only to teachers, and only for classes. And it was foolish. Though I always did reasonably well on the quizzes and tests, I shortchanged myself on a lot of great stories that I had to revisit later.
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I never lied about them. There were some I just didn’t read and chose to test over the class discussions, though.
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Yeah…it wasn’t the smartest move I ever made, that’s for sure. Thankfully, I’m caught up now.
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Never. There is no point in doing so. Just like you wrote. 😀 If you want people think you are well educated, then just educate yourself…don’t lie about it.
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Exactly.
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I haven’t lied, but I guess people lie about reading classics to come across as more educated? Who knows?
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Eh. Maybe. I’ve never asked someone about their reading and thought of how smart they are because they’ve read a certain book. Ugh.
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Me either, but that’s the only reason I could think that someone would lie. ’tis a strange world.
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They’re all just habitual liars. 😂
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I didn’t think of that 😀
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I really don’t see the point in lying about what you’ve read. People think it looks better to say that they’ve read the classics, but what’s the point if you can’t discuss it? It just makes you look silly if you so obviously have lied and there’s no shame in not having read them either, even if you’re a massive bookworm since there are so many books out there.
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Exactly. Just makes you look ridiculous.
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Pfft. I see no reason to lie about what you read. The only person who cares about the books you’ve read (aside from book snobs), is an English teacher. And then you can’t lie to him/her because they’ll grill you ceaselessly. What’s the point??? You don’t read classics? Who cares? I feel like people are trying to sound more important or something when they say they’ve read classics they haven’t read. Reading the classics doesn’t make you a better person or more interesting in the literary world.
Yeah, I read about this on another blog, as well, and just couldn’t understand it.
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Yes. Exactly. They’re trying to make themselves out to be more something by lying. But I don’t even know where the idea came from that reading particular books is any better or worse than not.
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I don’t lie about what I’ve read… However, with vey few exceptions, I hardly remember what I’ve read. I remember names of books and their authors about as readily as I remember song names and artists. That is, not at all. But I can quote text from the books I’ve read just like I can sing every lyric to songs. Just have no memory of where said passages/lyrics came from or who penned them. My brain is missing a circuit. Lol
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Hahaha oh wow. I can pretty easily remember the books I’ve read and their authors. But I definitely can’t quote anything. I couldn’t even quote The Hunger Games books more than a few times.
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Seems counterintuitive 🤔
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Mhm. And ridiculous.
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Have you read the year of reading dangerously? It’s a fab book about the author reading all the books he ever lied about reading in one year.
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Haha no. But that’s an interesting idea
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I can imagine lying about reading a book. It just makes no sense to me.
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Me neither!
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