Chapter 3 Chapter One The Vitality and Art of Reading

This is a book for people who read, or want to be people who read.Especially for people who want to read books.More specifically, this book is written for those who want to read books whose main purpose is to improve their understanding. The so-called "readers" here refer to those who today are still accustomed to absorbing a lot of information from written words to improve their understanding of the world, just like every well-educated and wise person in past history.Of course, not everyone can do this.Even before the advent of radio and television, much information and knowledge was obtained through oral tradition or observation.But for highly intelligent and curious people, this is not enough.They know they still have to read, and they really do.

Modern people have a feeling that reading is no longer as necessary as it used to be.Radio, and especially television, have replaced some of the functions formerly provided by books, just as photographs have replaced some of the functions previously provided by pictures or artistic designs.We have to admit that some functions of TV are indeed amazing, such as the image processing of news events, which has great influence.The biggest feature of the radio is that when we are doing something (such as driving), it can still provide us with information and save us a lot of time.But there is a serious question in the middle: Are these new-age communication media really improving our understanding of our own world?

Maybe we know more about the world than people before, and to some extent, knowledge has become a prerequisite for understanding.These are all good things.However, whether "knowledge" is necessarily a prerequisite for "understanding" may be quite different from what ordinary people think.In order to "understand" a thing, we don't need to "know" everything about it.Too much information is as much a hindrance to understanding as too little information.In other words, modern media are blocking our understanding with an overwhelming deluge of information.

One reason for this is that the media we've mentioned are so carefully designed that thought seems unnecessary (albeit only on the surface).How to package intellectual attitudes and viewpoints is one of the most active endeavors of the brightest minds today.Television viewers, radio listeners, and magazine readers are confronted with a complex composition—from original rhetoric to carefully selected data and statistics—all designed to be easily sorted out without difficulty or effort. Out of the "own" thoughts.But the information is so beautifully packaged that the viewer, listener, or reader doesn't have to draw their own conclusions.Instead, they took the packaged ideas directly into their heads, as naturally as a VCR would accept a videotape.He only needs to press a "rewind" button to find the appropriate speech he needs.He acts appropriately without thinking at all.

※ Active reading We said at the outset that we wrote for developing the skill of reading books.But if you really follow and practice these reading skills, you can apply them to reading anything in print—newspapers, magazines, brochures, articles, newsletters, even advertisements. Since any kind of reading is an activity, there must be some active energy.You can't read if you're completely passive—we can't read with our eyes closed and our minds lethargic.Since there is a contrast between active and passive reading, our goal is to first remind readers that reading can be more or less active.The second thing to point out is that the more active you are in reading, the better the effect.This reader is more active than another reader, and his ability to explore in the reading world is stronger, he gains more, and therefore he is more intelligent.The more the reader demands of himself, and of the book before him, the more he gets.

Although strictly speaking, there is no such thing as completely passive reading, many people still think that reading and listening are completely passive things compared with active writing and speaking.The writer and the speaker must make at least a little effort, but the listener or reader does nothing.The listener or reader is regarded as a kind of communication receiver, "receiving" the message that the other party is "giving" and "sending" very hard.The fallacy of this assumption is that this "reception" is akin to getting a punch, or an inheritance, or a court judgment.In fact, it is quite the opposite. The "reception" of the audience or readers should be like a catcher in a baseball game.

A catcher takes the same initiative at the catch as a pitcher or hitter.The pitcher or hitter is in charge of "sending", his concept of action is to get the ball moving.The responsibility of the catcher or outfielder is to "receive" and his action is to stop the ball.Both are an activity, just in a slightly different way.If anything is passive, it's the ball.The ball is imperceptible and can be thrown by the pitcher or caught by the catcher, depending on how the player plays.The relationship between author and reader is similar.What is written and what is read is shared, like the ball, by active, living parties, started by one and ended by the other.

We can push the concept of this analogy a step further.The art of the catcher lies in the skill of catching any ball—fastball, curveball, changeup, slowball, etc.Likewise, the art of reading is the art of grasping every message possible. It's worth noting that it's only successful when the catcher works closely with the pitcher.The same goes for the author-reader relationship.The writer doesn't intentionally throw the ball that the opponent can't catch, even though it sometimes appears to be so.In any case, successful communication occurs when the message the writer wants to convey to the reader happens to be grasped by the reader.The writer's skill and the reader's skill merge to reach a common end.

In fact, the author is a lot like a pitcher.Some writers know exactly how to "hold the ball": they know exactly what they're trying to convey, and they convey it precisely and accurately.So it's fair to say that they're easier to "catch" than a "slam" writer who has no "handling" ability. The one thing wrong with this analogy is that the ball is a single individual that is either fully caught or missed.But a work is a complex object, which may be accepted more or less; it is possible to accept only a little concept of the author to accept the whole idea.How much the reader wants to "catch" depends entirely on how active he is while reading, and how skillful he is at reading with different thoughts.

What are the conditions for active reading?We will come back to this question repeatedly throughout this book.At this moment we can only say: when the same book is given to different people to read, the fact that one person reads better than the other, first of all, lies in the fact that this person reads more actively; Activities are involved with more skills.These two things are closely related.Reading is a complex activity that, like writing, involves a large number of different activities.To achieve good reading, these activities are indispensable.The better a person can perform these activities, the better the reading will be.

※ Goals of reading: reading for information and reading for understanding You have a mind.Now let me assume again that you have a book you want to read.This book is written by someone who wants to communicate some ideas to you.Your success in reading this book depends entirely on how much of the message the author wants to convey. Of course, that's an oversimplification.For there may be two relations between your mind and the book, not one.There are two different experiences in reading that can symbolize these two different relationships. This is the book, that is your mind.As you read page after page, you either have a good understanding of what the author is trying to say, or you don't.If you know well, you gain information (but your understanding doesn't necessarily increase).If you understand this book from the beginning to the end, then the author and you are two minds cast in the same mold.The message in this book is just to convey what you both know before you read this book. Let's talk about the second case.You don't fully understand the book.Let's assume—unfortunately not always—that you know the book just enough to realize that you don't.You know the book has more to say than you know, and therefore think it contains something that will improve your understanding. what should you do thenYou can take the book to someone you think can read better than you and ask him to explain what you don't understand. ("He" may represent a person, or another book—a guide book or a textbook.) Or you may decide that it is not worth bothering with any book that is beyond your mind's comprehension, you understand enough too much.In either case, you are not really reading as this book says. There is only one way to actually read.Without any help from outside, you are just going to read this book.You have nothing, only relying on the strength of your heart, playing with the words and sentences in front of you, and slowly improving yourself, from only vague concepts to a clearer understanding.Such an improvement is a kind of mental activity when reading, and it is also a higher reading skill.This kind of reading is to let a book challenge your existing understanding. In this way, we can roughly define the so-called art of reading: it is a process of self-improvement by one's own efforts, without any external help, except for pondering some words and sentences in the reading materials.Your mind will advance from superficial understanding to deep understanding.And the operational skill that produces this result is the art of reading, which is composed of many different activities. Reading hard with your own mental activities, advancing from a superficial understanding to a deep understanding, is like breaking out of your own cocoon.It does feel that way.This is the most important role.Of course, there's a lot more activity than you're used to reading, and not just more activity, but the skills required to do it.In addition, of course, readings that usually require relatively difficult reading requirements have their corresponding values ​​and readers of the corresponding level. The difference between reading for information and reading for understanding cannot be measured in distance.Let's talk a little more.We must consider two purposes of reading.Because one is something to read and the other is something to have to read, the line between the two is often blurred.To the extent that we can distinguish these two purposes of reading, we can distinguish two different senses of the word "reading." The first meaning is that when we ourselves read newspapers, magazines, or other things, with our reading skills and intelligence, we can integrate them all at once.Such readings increase our information, but not our understanding, which is equal to theirs before we begin to read.Otherwise, we should have been stuck or intimidated along the way—that is, if we were honest and sensitive enough. The second sense is that one tries to read something that one does not understand very well at first.The level of this thing is a bit higher than the people who read it.What the author wants to express can enhance the understanding of the reader.This kind of communication between the two parties is bound to happen, otherwise, no matter whether it is through speeches or books, no one will ever be able to learn from others."Learning" here means understanding more things, not remembering more information—information at the same level as information you already know. For an intellectual, it is not very difficult to obtain some new information similar to the things he was familiar with from reading.When a person already knows some materials about American history and has some angles of understanding, he only needs to read in the first sense to obtain more similar materials and continue to use the original angle to understand.Suppose, however, that the history books he reads not only provide him with more information, but also enlighten him at a new or higher level among the information he already knows.That is to say, the understanding he gained from it surpassed his original understanding.If he can try to grasp this deeper understanding, he is reading in the second sense.He improved himself indirectly through the activity of reading. Of course, this cannot be achieved even if the author has something to teach him. Under what circumstances do we read for the sake of understanding?There are two situations: The first is unequal levels of understanding at the outset.In terms of comprehension of a book, the author must be "higher" than the reader. When writing a book, he must use a readable form to convey the insights he has but the reader does not have.Secondly, readers must overcome their unequal comprehension to a certain extent. Although they cannot be said to understand everything, they must always reach a level comparable to that of the author.Once the same level of understanding is achieved, clear communication is complete. Simply put, we can only learn from those who are "higher" than us.We must know who they are and how to learn from them.People who have this kind of thinking are people who can recognize the art of reading, and they are the main objects of our book.And anyone who can read has the ability to read in this way.Everyone, without exception, can read better and learn more as long as we put in the effort to apply such techniques to good reading. We do not want to give the reader the impression that, in fact, it is easy to distinguish between reading for information and insight and reading for comprehension.We must admit that sometimes just listening to others relay some information can also improve a lot of understanding.What we want to emphasize here is this: This book is about the art of reading, written to enhance understanding.Fortunately, once you learn this, the other point of reading for information is not a problem. Of course, in addition to obtaining information and understanding, reading also has some other goals, that is, entertainment.In any case, this book won't talk much about reading for entertainment.That's the least demanding thing that can be done without too much effort.And there are no rules for reading that way.Anyone who can read, and wants to read, can find a book to entertain him. In fact, any book that enhances understanding or adds information also has a recreational effect.Just like a book that can enhance our understanding, it can also be read purely for the information contained in it. (This is not true the other way around: not every book that is read for pleasure can be read to enhance our understanding.) We are by no means urging you to never read any book for pleasure.The point is, if you're looking for a good book that will help you develop your understanding, we can help.So if improving your understanding is your goal, our topic is the art of reading a good book. ※ Reading is Learning: The Difference Between Guided Learning and Self-Discovery Learning Absorbing information is a learning, and in the same way, coming to understand something you didn't understand before is a learning.But there are important differences between the two kinds of learning. To absorb information is simply to know that something has happened.To be enlightened is to understand, to figure out what is going on: why it happened, how it relates to other facts, what is the analogy, what is the difference of the same kind, and so on. It's easier to understand if you illustrate the difference between what you remember and what you can explain.If you remember what an author said, you learned something by reading it.If what he says is true, you've even learned something about the world.But whether what you learn is about the book or about the world, if all you're using is your memory, you're really getting nothing but the information.You are not inspired.To be inspired, in addition to knowing what the author said, you must also understand what he means and why he said it. Of course, you can both remember what the author said and understand what he said.Absorbing information is the previous action to be inspired.However, the point is not to stop at absorbing information. Montaigne said: "The ignorance of the beginner lies in the fact that he has not learned it, and the ignorance of the scholar lies in the fact that he has not learned it." The first kind of ignorance is that he has not even learned the alphabet, and of course he cannot read.The second kind of ignorance is reading many wrong books.The English poet Alexander Pope called such people bookworms, ignorant readers.There are always some nerds who read too much, but can't understand it.The Greeks had a special name for such a combination of reading and stupidity, and this can be applied to anyone of any age who is good at reading but can't read.They are called "half bottle of vinegar" (Sophomores). To avoid this mistake—the mistake of thinking that reading a lot is a good read—we must distinguish between different reading styles.This distinction has important implications for reading itself, as well as its relationship to education in general. Throughout the history of education, a distinction has always been made between guided learning and self-discovery.Guided learning occurs when one person teaches another, either verbally or in writing.Of course, we can learn without being taught.Otherwise, if every teacher had to be taught before he could teach others, there would be no beginning of seeking knowledge.Therefore, self-discovery learning is necessary—a learning process that occurs through research, investigation, or deliberation on your own without guidance. Self-discovery is learning without teacher guidance, while guided learning is learning with the help of others.Either way, only those who have really learned are active learners.Therefore, it is likely to be fallacious to say that self-discovery learning is active and guided learning is passive.In fact, any learning should not be lifeless, just like any reading should not be lifeless. This is very true.In fact, to make the distinction clearer, we could call directed learning "assisted self-discovery learning."Without going into the depths of a psychologist's study, we also know that education is a very special art, sharing the same vital qualities as the other two academic disciplines—agriculture and medicine.The doctor tries to do many things for the patient, but in the end the conclusion is that the patient must get better on his own - become healthy.The farmer does many things to his plants or animals, and the result is that these plants and animals must grow and become better.In the same way, the teacher may have exhausted the means to teach the student, but the student must be able to learn for himself.When he learns, knowledge will take root in his mind. The difference between directed learning and self-discovery learning—or we should rather say between assisted and unassisted self-discovery learning—a fundamental difference lies in the on the teaching materials.When he is directed—when he discovers himself with the help of a teacher—the learner bases his actions on the information conveyed to him.He acts on what he is taught, whether written or spoken.The way he learns is by reading or listening.Here we should pay attention to the close relationship between reading and listening.Leaving aside the subtle differences between these two ways of receiving information, we can say that reading and listening are the same art—the art of being taught.However, when a learner begins learning without any teacher guidance, the learner is acting from the ground of nature or the world, rather than being taught.This norm of learning constitutes unaided self-discovery learning.If we loosen the meaning of "reading" a bit, we can say that self-discovery learning—strictly speaking, unaided self-discovery learning—is learning to read the self or the world.Just like directed learning (being taught, or assisted learning) is the art of reading a book, including listening, and learning from its explanation. What about thinking?If "thinking" means using our minds to increase knowledge or understanding, and if self-discovery and directed learning are the only ways to increase knowledge, then thinking must occur in both types of learning s things.We must think when we read and listen, just as we must think when we study.Of course, these ways of thinking are different—like the two ways of learning. The reason why many people think that thinking is more relevant to unassisted (or research-based) self-discovery learning than supported learning is because they assume that reading and listening are effortless activities.A person may indeed think less when reading information or for entertainment than a person who is researching and inventing.And these are relatively passive reading methods.But for more active reading—reading that strives for comprehension—this statement is less true.No one who reads like this will say that it is a job that can be done without thinking at all. Thinking is only part of active reading.One must also use one's senses and imagination.One has to observe, remember, and use imagination where one cannot see.Again, this is the task that is often wanted to be emphasized in unassisted learning, but is forgotten or ignored in taught reading, or listening learning.For example, many people assume that a poet must use his imagination when he writes poetry, but they don't when he reads it.Simply put, the art of reading includes all the skills of unaided self-discovery learning: keen observation, quick and reliable memory, imaginative space, and of course, disciplined analysis and reflection.The reason for saying this is that reading is also a discovery—albeit a helped, not an unaided, process. ※ Attendance and absence of teachers Talking along the way, we seem to think of reading and listening as ways of learning from our teachers.To some extent, this is indeed true.Both ways are being taught, and both require the skill of being taught.For example, listening to a lecture is like reading a book, but listening to a poem read is the same as reading that poem in person.The rules enumerated in this book relate to these experiences.But there are good reasons for emphasizing the importance of reading and putting listening as a secondary consideration.For listening is learning from a teacher who is present—a living teacher—and reading is learning from an absent teacher. If you ask a living teacher a question, he will probably answer you.If you still don't understand what he said, you can ask him more questions to save yourself the time to think.However, if you ask a book a question, you must answer the question yourself.In such a case, the book is like nature or the world.When you ask a question, you will find the answer in the book only after you have done your own thinking and analysis. Of course, this is not to say that if you have a real teacher who can answer your questions, you don't need to do more homework.If what you're asking is a simple statement of fact, maybe so.But if you're after an explanation, you have to understand it, otherwise no one can explain it to you.Furthermore, when a living teacher appears in front of you, you can improve your understanding by understanding what he said.And if a book is your teacher, you're all on your own. Students in school often follow a teacher or mentor to read difficult books.But for those of us who are no longer in school, when we try to read a book that is neither a major nor an elective, that is, when our adult education depends entirely on the book itself, we can no longer have The teacher helped too.Therefore, if we are going to continue to learn and discover, we need to know how to let books teach us.In fact, that is the main purpose of this book.