Why should you re-read your favorite book?

My sister always lectures me why I should invest time in rereading my favorite novels too instead of always focusing on new books by different authors. She herself has read her favorites for about three times, and still can read it again when she has nothing else to read. The Keeper’s Tattoo, Clockwork Angel, and Pride and Prejudice have attained the top re-reads in her book shelf. I always wonder how she does it; how she is able to keep her interest intact and even enjoy the story once again after knowing the entire plot. This is what she told me.

Every time you read introduces a new horizon to your perspective. You focus on different aspects of the story rather than just the plot or the characters. For example, reading Harry Potter as a teen you were mesmerized by the magic, setting, characters and plot. Re-reading after years you would notice how the best thing about this series is that here the lesser known’s, the underdogs, the less confident are the heroes and game changers, in their own right.

‘A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age.’

We are changing every moment. A year later you wouldn’t be the same person you are now. You would have matured; your view points and perspectives would have evolved a lot. Our mind finds new information and emotions every time we go through the same situation. Imagine visiting your favorite world with a renewed perspective.

It gives you a wholesome experience of that virtual world. Revisiting old memories is the best experience.

'But at every rereading I seem to be reading a new book, for the first time. Is it I who keep changing and seeing new things of which I was not previously aware? Every time I seek to relive the emotion of a previous reading, I experience different and unexpected impressions, and do not find again those of before. ' -- Italo Calvino, If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

“...the reader who plucks a book from her shelf only once is as deprived as the listener who, after attending a single performance of a Beethoven symphony, never hears it again.”― Anne Fadiman, Rereadings: Seventeen writers revisit books they love

 “We do not enjoy a story fully at first reading. Not till curiosity, the sheer narrative lust, has been given its sop and laid asleep, are we at leisure to savor the real beauties.”  ― C.S. Lewis, On Stories: And Other Essays on Literature

 “There's nothing wrong with reading a book you love over and over. When you do, the words get inside you, become a part of you, in a way that words in a book you've read only once can't.” ― Gail Carson Levine, Writing Magic: Creating Stories that Fly

 “No book is worth reading that isn't worth re-reading.”― Susan Sontag

P.S: I confess I have re-read only 'Who will cry when you die?' by Robin Sharma. I keep going back           to the book whenever I feel down.