I remember that a book itself once felt like a great act of horror to me. I fought to avoid devoting even a second to a school reading assignment, without even trying to understand why I found literature and reading itself so difficult to endure. Now, more than a year after finishing my formal education, looking back with slightly more mature eyes, I wonder when exactly I began to appreciate paper, books, and the authors who allow me to hallucinate in front of a text, imagining this and that. But what exactly is a book, and why do we eventually begin to like it?

As I mentioned in earlier essays, I was not a particularly bright boy at school, and reading and books themselves felt like an unnecessary obligation to me, something that “someone was making me do again.” I thought this way for as long as I can remember, until roughly the middle of secondary school. Then, of my own free will, I picked up one of the Polish books. I started reading, and the book itself made a great impression on me. That was when everything began.

That book was “Króliczek” by Olgierd Dudek. Why that particular one? No reason. I simply took something from my sister's shelf, and since the book had a nice cover, I decided to read it. I got drawn into it and finished reading with some really serious thoughts about books themselves.

From that moment on, books became an inseparable part of my life. They accompanied me through good and bad times, made me more creative, more sensible, and, generally speaking, more refined, both in words and in actions.

Of course, I did not think about it that way back then. I read whatever I came across and whatever seemed interesting to me. After all these years, however, I ask myself what it was about books that captivated me so much. Today, I will try to answer that question.

Because you see, although you are original in every respect, you have certain limitations within yourself. You were born in one place, you live in a particular period, and you will experience a limited number of things. There is, however, a fascinating thing that I like to put this way:

A book crosses boundaries that we cannot cross ourselves. It may have been written a thousand years ago and give us insight into something that no longer exists today. It is almost like time travel. You can explore cities and countries, and if you prefer fiction, even entire worlds that you would not normally have access to.

By reading, you can learn about the experiences of a psychologist who talks to murderers, a prisoner who was sent to hard labour and later described his experiences, or a man who served in the military and came to know politics from a different side. This is what I consider one of the greatest advantages of reading. Books allow us to learn about experiences we will probably never have ourselves and to look at the world from other people's perspectives. But do books really make us more empathetic? More intelligent?

While preparing this essay, I came across some interesting research on the relationship between reading fiction and social cognition. A 2018 meta-analysis by Dodell-Feder and Tamir, covering 14 experimental studies, found a small but statistically significant effect of reading fiction on performance in tasks measuring social cognition. Emma Koopman, in turn, points out that the relationship between literature and empathy is complex and depends, among other things, on the type of text and the way the reader engages with it.

Simply reading a story does not guarantee that we will begin to understand others better. Fiction can, however, exercise our social imagination because it requires us to follow the motives and points of view of characters. Ultimately, much depends on how we read and what we take away from the experience.

Another important discovery for me was that reading should not be limited exclusively to what is comfortable and enjoyable. I know how that sounds, because pleasure is often precisely what makes us reach for books. However, confronting a difficult idea, an author we disagree with, or a viewpoint we consider wrong can give us much more to think about.

Over time, I understood that I cannot read only what confirms my beliefs. It is worth occasionally picking up Hegel or Freud, even if we disagree with their views. We can then test our own knowledge and perspective, and consider whether we truly believe what we claim to believe. This also reminds me of Kierkegaard's subject of borrowed desires, which I referred to in an earlier essay.

Books give us access to other people's thoughts and allow us to look at reality from another side. They can expand our knowledge, develop our imagination, and encourage us to question our own beliefs. This does not mean, however, that simply reading many books will automatically make us wiser people. The attention we give to our reading also matters, as does our willingness to reflect on what we encounter.

I do not want to sound like a poet, but in a certain sense, every book has a life of its own. It contains the thoughts of a person who devoted time to writing them down, and it may reach someone who interprets them in a completely different way from what the author originally intended. That is why it is worth approaching reading consciously and thoughtfully. After all, one can read exclusively to feed one's own ego, impress others, or collect more and more titles without giving them any real attention.

Now, let us move on to what I announced last week. Over the past two weeks, I have been working on a list of 100 books that I particularly value and recommend to other readers. I would like it to become a map for people beginning their reading journey, as well as for those who have already read their first books and are looking for something new.

The list is deliberately broad. It combines literature, philosophy, history, and biographies. I selected the books for their influence, literary value, the strength of the ideas they present, and their ability to open up new perspectives. It is neither a ranking nor a claim that everyone must read every title.

This is the first publication of this scale of its kind, and at the same time, the beginning of something I would like to develop in the future. I intend to update the list regularly, adding more books as I read and discover new titles worth recommending.

Finally, I would like to thank everyone who opens these emails every Sunday and spends even a moment reading my texts. I truly appreciate that you are here and that you are willing to devote your time to Refined Journal. Thank you once again. The list of 100 books is below.