Again this year, I kept a record of the media that I took in — in the sense of books, films, stage shows, journal articles, magazines, TV series, and (to a much lesser extent) long-form online content. (Last year’s post is here.)

Methodology

Every time I finished a work, I wrote down the work’s title, author, year of composition (if available), and the date I finished it, along with a one-letter annotation of its kind (b for book, f for film, etc.), and three kinds of formalized tag: ♲ for things I was re-watching or re-reading; ⭐ for things I decided were good enough to… well, to merit a star, I guess; and (new this year) 🗑 to distinguish “bad, terrible, avoid” from “decent, meh, whatever.” I also tried, haphazardly, to note down (in parentheses) when I started a work, plus a 🗑 if I confidently abandoned it as worthless.

That last notation allows me to see that I’ve been in the middle of (well, near the start of) the Morgante Maggiore for a whole year now.

I stuck with last year’s meaningless distinction between e-books and and b-ooks, and added a-udiobooks too, though the only audiobooks I listened to (in company with my lovely wife) were Dante’s Divine Comedy (in Herbert Kenny’s somewhat newbie-friendly but annoyingly alliterative translation, via Audible) and Robert Asprin’s Another Fine Myth (one I enjoyed as a kid and wanted to re-read; Audible).

Last year I haphazardly recorded some significant long-form essays or magazine articles under the o tag. This year I did the same; although now it’s abundantly clear that the o doesn’t stand for o-nline so much as l-o-ngform, or maybe “junk tax-o-n.” The five pieces I recorded this year are from 1900, 1913, 1990, 2003, and 2025. (Last year’s spanned “merely” 1924 to 2021.)

My magazine consumption has allegedly risen from 27 to 43 this year, but I suspect that’s due only to better recordkeeping. My consumption of journal articles — mostly through JSTOR, mostly in literary criticism — is legitimately high and rising. Did you know that almost all Wikipedia editors are entitled to free JSTOR access via their existing Wikipedia login?

All in all, I bothered to record my consumption of 2 `a`-udiobooks, 5 l-`o`-ngform pieces, 11 `p`-oems, 15 live `s`-tage shows and 9 `r`-ecordings of stage shows, 28 seasons of `t`-elevision, 38 dead-tree `b`-ooks, 43 `m`-agazines, 102 `j`-ournal articles, 152 `e`-books, and 228 `f`-ilms, for a total of 633 items. (Wow!)

Book clubs

Many “constellations” in my list center around works discussed in book clubs. In 2025, book clubs in which I participated finished Dante’s Divine Comedy; Plutarch’s Lives; Ovid’s Metamorphoses; Voltaire’s Candide; Virgil’s Aeneid; a selection of works by Jorge Luis Borges; and Richard Adams’ Watership Down.

I also attended a discussion on Walter Scott’s The Antiquary (1816), a book I came not even remotely close to finishing. I can handle a three-volume novel like The Mummy! all right, but only because it’s got mummies and robots. Replace them with impenetrably accented Scottish peasants and it becomes a slog, relieved only inadequately by the occasional seal-fight.

Recommendations and breakdowns

In 2024 I recorded 12 great (⭐) movies I’d seen for the first time and 11 I’d rewatched. This year those numbers were 5 new and 25 rewatched. I think this jibes with my expectations: Keeping the list last year reminded me that I already know a lot of good films I want to rewatch — every year, if possible — and all I have to do is… do it.

Why such a drop in the number of stars awarded to new-to-me films? Did I spend less time watching new movies because I was revisiting old friends? No: I recorded 228 films this year, up from 200 last year. Were my standards higher because of re-exposure to the classics? Maybe. I don’t know.

Anyway, the new-to-me movies I really enjoyed this year were Passage to Marseille (1944), Altered States (1980), Oscar (1991), Luther (2003), and Clear History (2013). Altered States in particular is worth going into unspoiled.

Last year I recorded 12 new ⭐ books and 4 re-reads. This year those numbers were 15 new and 4 re-reads, plus an honorable mention for Milman Parry’s posthumous The Making of Homeric Verse (1971); which at 478 pages I did not attempt to finish, but I read three or four of the essays. In general, collections and anthologies continue to pose problems for my methodology: I could read five of the ten essays in a collection and not record a b (since it was “unfinished”), yet if I read just one of those same essays on JSTOR, I’d record it as a distinct j. Nonetheless, the Edward Wagenknecht–edited Chaucer: Modern Essays in Criticism (1959) makes the list as an ensemble performance.

Another odd entry here is the last one: Henry Norman Hudson’s edition of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar has such insightful and entertaining footnotes that I gave it its own entry. Hudson emphasizes the degree to which Shakespeare drew from Plutarch’s Life of Brutus, Life of Caesar, and Life of Antony, including extensive quotation from Plutarch attached to specific scenes in the play. (In fact I was reading Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar cover-to-cover for the first time only because our Plutarch book club this year finished our 2+-year reading of the Lives and chose the play for a digestif.)

My highest praise to Oscar Wilde’s The Decay of Lying (1891), which was new to me in March of this year. I keep running into situations where it’s quotable; and when I see someone else quoting it, I smile. Samuel Butler’s Erewhon is also full of memorable bits, although there is some padding between. It convinced me to buy a copy of Butler’s magnum opus The Way of All Flesh for my tsundoku shelf; maybe you’ll see that on next year’s list.

Stephen King’s The Revenge of Lard-Ass Hogan (1975) was new to me last December; I re-read it in May (alongside Rob Reiner’s film Stand By Me) and once again couldn’t keep a straight face. Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot (1952) is excellent; only Jamie Lloyd’s 2025 stage production was bad.

The rest comprise j-ournal articles, m-agazine issues, r-ecorded stage shows, live s-tage shows, and t-elevision series.

As of this writing I am about three months behind on my Atlantic and New York subscriptions. I forget completely how the Atlantic’s December 2024 and May 2025 issues earned their stars, but I do remember thinking “This one’s firing on all cylinders for once.”

San Francisco’s Gilbert & Sullivan troupe, the Lamplighters, published through their Patreon a recording of their 1995 gala performance, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern’s Excellent Adventure. It’s “back in the vault” now, sadly — the YouTube link is private — but it is absolutely delightful. Meanwhile, NYC’s Blue Hill Troupe staged an excellent performance of G&S’s rarely-performed Grand Duke

In 2025 I binge-watched the entirety of HBO’s The Wire. Highly recommended.

Anti-recommendations

Movies I abandoned with a 🗑 this year included InAPPropriate Comedy (2013), Without Warning (1980), Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017), Nosferatu (2025), Bobi Wine, the People’s President (2025), Love Hurts (2025), Robot Jox (1989), Skiptrace (2016), Maniac Cop (1988), The Alto Knights (2025), 28 Years Later (2025), Such Men Are Dangerous (1930) — to be fair, in a very bad transfer on YouTube — and Inside (2023).

Movies I finished with a 🗑 this year included Rancid Aluminum (2000), Julius Caesar Against the Pirates (1962), Wicked (2024), Black Bag (2025), Joker: Folie à Deux (2024), Strip Search (2004), Batman: The Killing Joke (2016), Road Wars: Max Fury (2024), Il Prato Macchiato di Rosso (1973), Pulse (2006), Drop (2025), The King’s Whore (1990), Jurassic World: Rebirth (2025), and The Empty Man (2020).

My complete 633-element list is here.