Probably every good reader was a performative reader at some point. Basically all smart people are concerned at various points of life with whether others perceive them as smart. Not a big deal if your motives are imperfect or whatever, you can mature past that.
sad Japanese man literature (Mishima, Dazai etc) is so effortlessly self-absorbed and raw and convincing that you really have to be careful with it. Read No Longer Human at the wrong time and you'll be thinking yeahhh. Drunk and sexy and sad and smarter than everyone. Thats me
happy pride today a homeless man asked me why i dont have a girlfriend and i said its because im ugly and fat and he went "so? im ugly and homeless and got 2 kids"