Introducing My Reading Log "Reviews in Marginalia"

Reading as a Process of Passionate Engagement

One day, I hope to have a room in my home that I can make into my own personal library, housing all the books I hold dear. A more childlike me dreamt of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves taking up each wall, a rolling ladder to help me reach all the high places (like in the bookstore Belle frequented in her little French town), and a cushioned window seat that would function as my reading nook. If I ever take on motherhood (or… motherhood takes on me…), my children can learn about who their mom was through these books, as much a material artifact as photos and handwritten letters (which I also have no shortage of).

It is from a futon next to a window on the second floor of my parents’ house that I am writing this. I have described kanto as a digital paper trail of the processual, and while it’s purposefully open for any readers out there, it’s also for my own records. In that sense, kanto is a bookkeeping project.

I first heard about the word “marginalia” as a senior in college. I was taking a course in early British Literature (not so much from a particular interest in British literature as much as it was a major requirement, and I happened to be fond of the professor), and our term assignment was to choose 10 pages of Pamela; Or, Virtue Rewarded (1740) by Samuel Richardson (generally thought to be the first English novel) to respond to, whether by writing or sketching. My professor found inspiration for this assignment from the article “A Year in Marginalia: Sam Anderson” (2010), in which (you guessed it) Sam Anderson describes marginalia as “the most intimate, complete, and honest form of criticism possible.” [I found Anderson’s article on dialogic marginalia fun, too. Wouldn’t doing this across family generations be a beautiful tradition?]

This is part of my professor’s description of the term assignment.

Now, I have an aversion to the word “annotation” because my secondary school education did not provide me with a meaningful understanding of it. The word evokes mandatory summer readings like Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) and Homer’s Odyssey (the one translated by Robert Fagles). I vividly recall the first hour of class time in middle school Gifted & Talented ELA being dedicated to reading and “annotating,” and we could choose whichever book from that teacher’s class library if we didn’t already have one. Annotating was never modeled for me, and I was embarrassed to ask for help (I had just moved to that middle school), so I just made myself look busy. Bruh, tell me why I was trying to annotate Matched (2010) by Allie Condie… What was I supposed to write down on a sticky note— “I hope Cassia ends up with Xander”? It’s not like I had any knowledge of dystopian fiction; I was reading for the romance (I love love). Just thinking about it makes me laugh and cringe. Thank God the teacher never checked the actual content of our annotations and only checked for completion.

All of that to say I was skeptical of how productive this final assignment in British Lit could be.

What follows are some snippets of my attempt at marginalia for the British lit final.

I like taking stock of phrases and words that seem out of place, like the “saucy pedantic wretch” line in John Donne’s aubade “The Sun Rising” (1633).

Clearly, I am not a fan of Mr. B’s character, even if Samuel Richardson may not have intended for his readers to take Mr. B seriously.

Well… I ended up unlocking a deep enjoyment from “talking back to the text.” In the reflection I submitted as part of the term assignment, I wrote that I found myself choosing between a meaningful read and a pleasurable read, as if I could never have both. The practice of marginalia gives me both.

This is part of the reflection I submitted for the British Lit final, with some of my professor’s comments included.

My professor’s framing of marginalia as “a way to insist on reading as a process of passionate engagement” was something I could get on board with. I have since been won over. I hope you give marginalia a try. (´◡`)

I most often read poetry, high fantasy, and non-fiction (“thinky books,” as a close friend describes it), but my marginalia practice is concentrated on non-fiction because it not only gives me something to chew, it also gives me something I know I can (for the most part) digest (I have a hard time digesting poetry, and high fantasy is more drinkable than chewable for me). The marginalia I do for non-fiction texts is largely circling and highlighting the concepts I want to remember. For the kanto reading log “Reviews in Marginalia,” I am taking inspiration from Gari De Ramos’s Radical in Progress website and summarizing my key takeaways in a way that is intelligible to my future self so she can use it as a refresher. I am also giving myself free rein to rant and ramble.

If you follow along with my marginalia practice, I urge you to not take my word for it! This is strictly my own attempt to derive meaning and make sense of things, and while it can inform your own praxis, it cannot be a substitute for your own critical work.

With the advent of 2024, I wish you a fruitful year to come. Happy reading!

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