I was taking a look through my stats recently and saw a keyword phrase that caught my attention. After almost six years and Google’s move to ‘not provided’ mean I don’t tend to see new data from search visitors so this was rather novel.

I’ve used the phrase as the title of this post because it’s spot on. I really felt for this person as I expect many of you will also. Spoilers are something that, as a reader, you’re going to struggle with at some point, whether you like them or not; more often nowadays with the Internet, information more available.

I’ve dealt with the problem a number of times, most recently a couple of years ago when I was reading an unrelated article that, without warning, spoiled the ending of Anna Karenina. Many of the comments on the article thanked the author, sarcastically, for it.

This is where I get to answering my visitor’s question. There are a couple of ways to deal with spoilers you’d prefer you didn’t know. In my Tolstoy case, I knew that the spoiler was so strong I’d likely never forget it; the best way to deal with the situation was to move the book from its then current position, far down my list – I didn’t even have a copy of it – to the top. I was never going to forget the spoiler, I might as well just read the book now. By reading it now I would be making the best of the situation and could possibly turn it into a positive – I likely otherwise would still not have read it to this day. The timely release of the newest film adaptation cemented my decision.

In this case we can say that to a point I embraced the spoiler; this reading was undertaken in a different way to my usual. I was reading the book to see why and how things transpired as they did rather than to enjoy the plot. I did enjoy the plot but from the point of view of pacing and style rather than any thrill or anticipation. Ironically I ended up reading the book in a way more akin to re-reading; whilst I’m still not happy to have had it spoiled I appreciate that my accidental knowledge may have aided the output of Further Thoughts posts I finished my reading with. Knowing the climax meant I could write in context before my time.

If you don’t want to read the book now, if you want to rebel against this unwanted spoiling, there’s really only one other option – don’t read it. Wait until later, see if you can wait long enough, without reminding yourself of the details, that you forget them. Perhaps it helps that I had no immediate nor long-term plans anyway but a crucial element of Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde was spoiled for me some years ago by someone who used the phrase ‘everybody knows that…’ without thinking that that statement is so rarely true – and I have successfully forgotten it. I have a vague notion of what it pertained to but not the specifics, nothing to lead me to remember unless some other person uses the same statement. (I’m very much against the thinking behind the use of ‘everybody knows that…’ because it’s asking for upset and embarrassment.)

Whilst waiting it may help to read around the book in such a way that the detail you learned becomes blurred. Muddy the waters. It’s easier said than done but sometimes reading something like it but not the same can cause you to become confused – the aim here is to achieve the result of the history lover who goes on to read so many fictional re-tellings that they forget the facts. (Of course the history lover would have to be more fair-weather for this to really happen, hence the difficulty.)

Use the spoiler as a bittersweet nudge towards reading the book or do your best to hamper your memory. That’s really all you can do.

What do you do when you learn of spoilers for books you’re wanting to read?