When I saw that The Orangutan Librarian wrote a post on The Magic of Rereading Children’s Books, I knew that I was going to love it. If you’ve followed me or if you’ve searched the term “rereading” in my blog, you should know that I’m a huge fan of rereading. I try to set aside some time every year just to reread books that I already have, and I’ve published reviews of books that I’ve read before.

Why? Because I really don’t believe that books are a “once and done” experience – it might have been slightly traumatising back in school, but rereading a book multiple times can have benefits.

But really, why reread? I can hear the imaginary person object. After all, there are so many books out there and there

Fine, here are three concrete reasons why rereading is great:

Books can be like rivers – You never step in the same one twice

When we read, we read through the lens created by our experiences and the life we’ve lived so far. That means that even if you’re reading the same book a second time, the “you” who’s reading the book could be a very different person and you could have different feelings towards the book and/or notice different things. I’ve found the reviews of Narnia and Nancy Drew over at Pages Unbound interesting for this very reason – we probably will not enjoy our childhood favourites the same way. We may not even enjoy the book we read a year ago the same way; in between readings, we would have read other books that might have changed our worldview or opened our eyes to a certain topic in society.

Speaking from personal experience, the first time I read Brave Story, I felt so angry for Wataru and what he had to go through because of the selfishness of his dad. Basically, I read the book with a viewpoint very similar to Wataru’s and the fact that Miyabe didn’t provide a “satisfying” conclusion for this storyline disappointed me. The second time I read the book, I was much older and I found myself appreciating how Miyabe handled this touchy subject and I could see why she wrote the book the way she did.

It’s the same book, but a different reading experience.

Rereading may be more relaxing than reading

I don’t know about you, but I have to pay more attention to a book the first time I read it. After all, everything is really new and I don’t actually know what’s going to happen. But the second time I read the book, I (hopefully) remember the ending and the major plot twists, which for me means that I can relax and just enjoy the journey. Often, that helps me to notice new things about the book, like in the previous point. Even when it comes to mysteries, if there have been clues sprinkled throughout the book, I find that I am only able to find them the second or third time I read!

Also, I may be really weird, but sometimes when I’m stressed, I like to read (or watch) something that’s familiar so that part of my brain gets to turn off and I can just enjoy the story or pause it halfway if I need to.

Rereading can help you make the most of your home library

I’ve talked before about my non-curated personal library, and in that post, I quoted from an article that talked about the uses of a library. Perhaps it’s not a surprise that “enjoy the pleasures of rereading” is in there because what’s the use of collecting many books if you’re not going to read them more than once?

Rereading is one of the great joys of having a collection of books. It means that you’re regularly engaging with your physical books (and ebooks too!) by returning to them over and over again. That’s actually how some people determine whether to keep a book or not – a book that they would not touch again and would not use as a reference is a prime candidate to be weeded out from the library.

A part of me also feels that if I’ve gone to the trouble of getting a physical book with its costs of production and delivery, it’s more environmentally friendly to make sure that I make full use of it via rereading instead of keeping it as a decorative item.

And there you have it, three reasons for why rereading is great and why we should be rereading more often. Mixed up in this, which I didn’t mention because it’s not totally relevant, is the thought that we don’t need to chase the new releases and help publishers promote books when book blogs/reading is a personal hobby for us, not a business. But that is a slightly different topic and I just want to use this post to encourage you to reread if you feel the urge to! Writing this has definitely started me thinking on when I want to conduct my rereading season – perhaps in June, after I finish all the books I’ve already borrowed!