Reading over other people's shoulders

[ciphergoth]

I can't help it. No matter how I try, I will always find myself glancing at what my fellow passengers are reading - their books, their newspapers, sometimes their drafts of the romantic novels they are writing.

What I find strangest is the way they seem to resent it so. Ok, this is understandable if what you're reading is a love letter, or even a text message, and in these cases I try extra hard to avert my eyes. But "Vernon God Little"?

Your efforts to angle the pages to shield them from my eyes, while trying to pretend that's not what you're doing, are incredibly pathetic and laugable. Are you frightened that the very letters will fly from the page into my eyes, denying you the pleasure of reading them? Or do you see the book as a hard-won trophy of your ability to pay for it, and thus resent sharing access to even fragments of a page? (This latter explanation, ludicrous as it may seem, is supported by the observation that Metro readers appear to be somewhat less rabidly propertarian over their reading material).

The other surprising thing I infer from their horrified reaction is that not everyone does this. How do you avoid it? Unless I have a book or a paper of my own, my eyes will wander for some interest, and attempts to corral them only hold then in briefly. I'm not allowed to stare at my fellow passengers - eyes must point firmly down, that rule I don't forget - and so it is on the reading matter that I inevitably feast - or at least, snack guiltily.

I'm listening in on your phone conversations too. But I'm sorry to report that in the brief time that we were sat together, the gentleman who inspired this little rant did not have the good grace to glance at my mobile phone and discover that I was writing about him. Pah!

Comments

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

Hey, it's not as if I'm craning in over their shoulder for a better look. All it seems to take is an unconcious glance or two from my normal sitting position for the walls to go up...

[thekumquat.livejournal.com]

Yes - that's what I find odd - how can they *tell* that the person sitting next to them is making the odd glance at them? Unless they're simultaneously making glances at the people next to them to check whether they're looking at them, or if the shoulder-readers people are complaining about are the ones who do lean over and make it more obvious.

[booklectica]

Isn't that the auto-kinetic sense (if I have that right)? The one that means you can tell where your hand is and also means you know when people are watching you?

I could have this completely wrong. dr_d will probably know.

[thekumquat.livejournal.com]

The auto-kinetic thing is how you know where your hand is in space (my sense of it is fairly crap). But that's part of you - I have no idea how people can tell if other people are looking at them/their book unless they're looking at the other people. Can you?

[booklectica]

I think I can - maybe out of the corner of my eye. Might make this a post and canvass opinion on whether people can tell they're being watched...