Ithacan, 71

As a retired Theatre professor, I am profoundly grateful for no longer having to read academic writing, with its passive voices, nominalizations, tentative semi-assertions, profusion of semicolons, and general snootiness. I am now free to indulge my passion, and I usually have between 2-5 books going at once. The current set is "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman; a collection and exploration of common American proverbs; and the short stories of J.G. Ballard. I am not so much for current literature (although, on a friend's recommendation, I read and loved R.D. Kuang's "Babel", as there are SO VERY MANY books that have stood the test of time, and about which I know nothing.
If I were stranded on a desert island, I'd fret more about not having any print to read than I would about luxuries like water, food, and shelter.