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What We See When We Read
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A gorgeously unique, fully illustrated exploration into the phenomenology of reading-how we visualize images from reading works of literature, from one of our very best book jacket designers, himself a passionate reader. A VINTAGE ORIGINAL.
What do we see when we read? Did Tolstoy really describe Anna Karenina? Did Melville ever really tell us what, exactly, Ishmael looked ...more
What do we see when we read? Did Tolstoy really describe Anna Karenina? Did Melville ever really tell us what, exactly, Ishmael looked ...more
Paperback, 425 pages
Published
August 5th 2014
by Vintage
(first published August 2014)
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Cheryl
I don't think so. There's really not any science here at all. It's self-referential philosophy.
Community Reviews
Showing 1-30
‘We perform a book, and we attend the performance.’
Words have a unique power to impose pictures into the inward eye of the mind In a recent thread, a friend commented on how Homer, despite his supposed blindness, had the ability to create metaphors which were more visual and imaginatively stunning that modern CGI has been able to manage. Words have a power that even visual stimulation cannot capture. It is interesting to consider the cliche that ‘the book is better than the movie’ which—in most ...more
Words have a unique power to impose pictures into the inward eye of the mind In a recent thread, a friend commented on how Homer, despite his supposed blindness, had the ability to create metaphors which were more visual and imaginatively stunning that modern CGI has been able to manage. Words have a power that even visual stimulation cannot capture. It is interesting to consider the cliche that ‘the book is better than the movie’ which—in most ...more
Dec 07, 2016
Amalia Gavea
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
non-fiction,
psychology-mentality
My mother has a most unusual reading habit. She is an avid reader and is able to finish a 500 page book in a day. This is not the strange thing here. What is beyond surprising is the fact that she doesn't form ''pictures'' in her head as she reads. She reads the words but doesn't feel the need to ''play out'' the action using her imagination. Also, she claims that writing essays was her weakest part at school. Her function of imagining things has always been below average. No wonder she is the m
...more
What an utterly absorbing and fascinating read. Mendelsund, a renowned cover designer, looks into exactly what the title suggest, what we see (or think we see) when we read. He dissects everything from first lines and impressions to the performative nature of reading; the reader as a part of the text to how memory implants itself on the mind's eye while reading. It's packed with illustrations and provides an excellent starting point to further examine what we are doing exactly when we read words
...more
I somehow forgot to review this one despite reading it in preparation for my Reading May Experience course, and using some of the quotations and bits from it in reflection prompts.
This is a visual study on what we know about reading. This is a book I'd like to own and dip in and out of from time to time, a real pleasure. Most people who read will get something out of it.
This is a visual study on what we know about reading. This is a book I'd like to own and dip in and out of from time to time, a real pleasure. Most people who read will get something out of it.
“The openings of To the Lighthouse and Moby-Dick are confusing for the reader – we haven’t yet been given sufficient informati...more
I must begin this review by stating my prejudice of supreme enjoyment when reading about reading. I find this enterprise endlessly fascinating. The more I examine it the more there seems to examine.
Along with the purity of sheer enjoyment there was nothing which shattered my world, nor though was it a dry review of what I already knew. By including drawings, pieces of conceptual art-he is best known for designing book covers for well known works-he conjured from his imagination pictorials which ...more
Along with the purity of sheer enjoyment there was nothing which shattered my world, nor though was it a dry review of what I already knew. By including drawings, pieces of conceptual art-he is best known for designing book covers for well known works-he conjured from his imagination pictorials which ...more
Com gráficos, fotografias, desenhos e um mínimo de texto, Mendelsund - utilizando exemplos de alguns romances clássicos - elabora um exercício muito divertido sobre o acto de leitura; como cada leitor "vê" as personagens, os lugares...
"Não faça isso, por favor não o faça! O inseto não pode ser representado. Não pode sequer ser mostrado ao longe."
Esta é a mensagem enviada por Kafka ao editor de Metamorfose, talvez com o objetivo de proteger os atos imaginativos dos seus leitores.
Agora percebi bem ...more
"Não faça isso, por favor não o faça! O inseto não pode ser representado. Não pode sequer ser mostrado ao longe."
Esta é a mensagem enviada por Kafka ao editor de Metamorfose, talvez com o objetivo de proteger os atos imaginativos dos seus leitores.
Agora percebi bem ...more
This book fascinated me and intrigued me -- and it will change the way I write. The images -- and the interpretation of the images -- taught me so much. Absolutely terrific and clever and, yes, a lot of fun.
"O Que Vemos Quando Lemos" (2014) é um livro interessante mas que tem de ser lido com muito espírito crítico, algo que não me parece ao alcance dos alunos do 9º ano, a quem o livro é recomendado em Portugal. A razão não se reduz apenas à falta de suporte científico para o que se vai debitando, mas agudiza-se com a forma desprezível como olha para essa cientificidade, assumindo a perspectiva do autor como perspectiva de verdade. Ou seja, afirmando o meramente anedótico ("eu acho que é assim", ou
...more
Jan 29, 2018
João Carlos
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
non-fiction,
l2018
Peter Mendelsund é director de arte da Alfred A. Knopf, uma das mais conceituadas editoras norte-americanas, e um premiado desenhador de capas de livros, produzindo «as capas de livros mais icónicas e imediatamente reconhecíveis da ficção contemporânea» - (http://covers.petermendelsund.com/).
”O Que Vemos Quando Lemos” tem textos e ilustrações – numa obra literária que discorre sobre literatura e sobre as imagens. Sendo designer Peter Mendelsund reflecte sobre o processo de imaginar coisas a part ...more
”O Que Vemos Quando Lemos” tem textos e ilustrações – numa obra literária que discorre sobre literatura e sobre as imagens. Sendo designer Peter Mendelsund reflecte sobre o processo de imaginar coisas a part ...more
Peter Mendelsund’s “What We See When We Read” might almost be useful to those just coming to the idea of immersive, experiential reading, analytical reading, especially non-fiction, does not figure into this work, but for those who’ve been following, or studying, the phenomenon of non-critical reading this will be a tedious read.
The graphics are excellent, but they are disguising the fact you are reading a very, very short book—only 21k. The problem with this is that what you are getting is les ...more
The graphics are excellent, but they are disguising the fact you are reading a very, very short book—only 21k. The problem with this is that what you are getting is les ...more
I started off liking this book. I thought Mendelsund was on to something interesting and original. But the more I read, the more I felt I was reading something by a postmodernist writer. You know the type. They sound high and mighty, but in the end it's impossible to tell what their point is, assuming they have a point.
Mendelsund makes a great deal of how we imagine the characters of a novel look like. Well, I, for one, make no attempt to imagine how Anna Karenina looks like when I read the nov ...more
Mendelsund makes a great deal of how we imagine the characters of a novel look like. Well, I, for one, make no attempt to imagine how Anna Karenina looks like when I read the nov ...more
Parts were really thought-provoking, but my quibble with this book is simply that I don't read the way the author reads. If there is a chair in the corner that the author doesn't describe, I don't wonder what color or style the chair is. If a scene takes place in a city I've never seen and the city isn't described, I don't graft Philadelphia on top of it. So the "WE see ..." and "WE feel..." statements don't ring true for me, and that colored my impression of the book. Maybe the title should hav
...more
In some places I was all like WOAH NO WAY and other places I was all like YEAH NO SHIT and other places I was all like LOL and other places I was all like PICTURES. 4 stars.
♡_♡
Há livros que se tornam interessantes pela história que portam, ou pelas personagens. Este é interessante porque nos leva a olhar para a forma como criamos essas representações e se as criamos realmente. Ler é uma ilusão.
When reading Moby Dick, does Ishmael look like Richard Basehart? How about Anna Karenina? Please don’t tell me she looked like Keira Knightley. What We See When We Read takes a look at the activity of reading with such depth and insight. Looking at not only the way our brain fills in the images but also what the author is trying to say. Take for example Karenin in Anna Karenina; his ears are described a few times within the novel but they get bigger. The size of his ears is an artistic simulacru
...more
A whimsical graphic journey that invites us to ask ourselves: Just what is going on in our heads when we read fiction? Do we really SEE Anna Karenina? Why does it seem boring and unnecessary when writers try to write detailed descriptions of their characters—hair, eyes, skin, bearing—and why do singular markers, like slender hands, or a certain way of holding the chin, work better? How do books with illustrations change how we see the characters? What do we give up when we let an actor in a movi
...more
Peter Mendelsund is the author of this delightful little book, ‘What We See When We Read.’ He has designed many book covers and he’s an avid reader. He delves into the mysteries of how our imaginations create the world of the book we are reading. I’ve mostly thought of a book as a movie unwinding before me visually but of course it’s so much more than that. Because in the movie we don’t often have access to the characters thoughts like we do in books. And of course most movies last only a couple
...more
This book is the pinnacle of 'show don't tell.' It's written & illustrated by a highly regarded book cover designer. 2 of his designs that I'm fascinated by are The Kafka Covers, you know which ones. They have the creepy eyes on them. And the James Joyce books, the minimalist covers with the corrections as part of the design.
Mendelsund designed a book that shows us what we see, when we read. It's so literal the pages of Dickens' opening lines for Bleak House drift into London's Fog. We can e ...more
Mendelsund designed a book that shows us what we see, when we read. It's so literal the pages of Dickens' opening lines for Bleak House drift into London's Fog. We can e ...more
Patronizing/ insulting. Almost nothing objective, much less scientific. Lots of material collected from others, for example Nabokov on Dickens... did we really need Mendelsund's take layered on top of that? So much of this stuff, like mapping the course of the characters' fortunes, is taught to schoolchildren.
Most of the rest is self-indulgent sophomoric philosophizing. The kind of stuff done in the common room of the dormitory in the middle of the night, when participants are high on stress, fr ...more
Most of the rest is self-indulgent sophomoric philosophizing. The kind of stuff done in the common room of the dormitory in the middle of the night, when participants are high on stress, fr ...more
once a reading of a book is under way, and we sink into the experience, a performance of a sort begins...jacket designer (and knopf associate art director) peter mendelsund has produced some of the most iconic cover art of recent years (a quick google image search is revealing). what we see when we read is an exam ...more
we perform a book - we perform a reading of a book. we perform a book, and we attend the performance.
(as readers, we are both the conductor and the orchestra, as well as the audience)
As I round the corner to my 140th of the year, I can say WHAT WE SEE WHEN WE READ stands atop as the most brilliant I’ve read of all. Arranged both conceptually and visually in mouth-gaping magnificence, genius Peter Mendelsund captures the very essence—the shared bond—of our reading pleasure. The author is a master artist, both visually and now narratively. This is his magnum opus. This is why we read.
“When we read, we take in whole eyefuls of words. We gulp them like water.”
In a mix of narrati ...more
“When we read, we take in whole eyefuls of words. We gulp them like water.”
In a mix of narrati ...more
Este é um livro totalmente diferente do que tenho lido. Não é um livro sobre livros, mas um livro sobre a leitura e o que formamos na nossa mente quando lemos. E vai além do título, pois não se refere apenas às imagens visuais que criamos, mas também às sensações captadas pelos restantes sentidos.
Ao ler a descrição de uma pessoa, imaginamo-la todos da mesma maneira? Ou será que um nariz afilado se transforma em imagens diferentes de leitor para leitor? E quando lemos a descrição de uma paisagem, ...more
Ao ler a descrição de uma pessoa, imaginamo-la todos da mesma maneira? Ou será que um nariz afilado se transforma em imagens diferentes de leitor para leitor? E quando lemos a descrição de uma paisagem, ...more
This book was incredible and a must-read for any bibliophile. It explores what we picture when we read novels, in particular focusing on characters. Mendelsund is a graphic designer who specialises in book covers, so the design of this book is superlative. Filled with maps, drawings and diagrams, each page is a pleasure and a surprise. I devoured this book. It made me think really deeply about what I visualise when I’m reading. My only complaint was that it wasn’t longer and therefore didn't go
...more
What We See When We Read by Peter Mendelsund should have been a delightful and insightful book. It wasn't; not for me. It's unusual, with many pages black with white print, clever (and not so clever) illustrations. Bits of text from novels shown in ways that purportedly illustrate how we see them. None of this worked for me. Next time you're in the library or a bookstore take a look at it. I'm sure it would appeal to somebody; maybe that's you.
I read a library copy. This is not a book for the ...more
I read a library copy. This is not a book for the ...more
Peter Mendelsund is one of the best jacket designer (and knopf associate art director) out there. What we see when we read has to be one of the smartest books ever written (and designed) about reading and imagining....I absolutely loved it.
Jun 25, 2016
Özlem Güzelharcan
rated it
liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
on-writing,
illustrated-novel
Okuması pek bir keyifli.
It's really beautifully illustrated, but it doesn't really say much. Not having read the classics that he uses for examples (Anna Karenina, Dickens, books many people will have read) didn't help my disconnect, but I don't think that was the problem. It just didn't say much that illuminated how I read, there was nothing that made me say, "ah, interesting." I was hoping to get it at the same time as his other new book, Cover, since I read that they work well together, but the library has a will of
...more
Autors teoretizē kā mēs redzam un ko mēs redzam, kad lasām. Noskaidrojas, ka ļoti sīka detalizācija nemaz nepalīdz "ieraudzīt" lasīto. Tāpat mēs pilnīgi skaidri varoņus neredzam, tie vairāk līdzinās sliktiem fotorobotiem. Un tā tālāk. Tāda lasīšanas pieredzes preperēšana ir interesanta, tikai autora akadēmiskais stils brīžiem ierobežoja teksta izprašanu.
Excertos do livro:
«Enquanto leitores, somos tanto o maestro quanto a orquestra, assim como audiência.» (p. 160)
«(...) lemos porque os livros nos concedem prazeres únicos; prazeres que os filmes, a televisão e outros não podem oferecer.» (p. 192)
Review:
http://silenciosquefalam.blogspot.pt/...
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“If books were roads, some would be made for driving quickly - details are scant, and what details there are appear drab - but the velocity and torque of the narrative is exhilarating. Some books, if seen as roads, would be make for walking - the trajectory of the road mattering far less than the vistas these roads might afford. The best book for me: I drive through it quickly but am forced to stop on occasion, to pull over and marvel.”
—
19 likes
“Once a reading of a book is under way, and we sink into the experience, a performance of a sort begins...
We perform a book-we perform a reading of a book. We perform a book, and we attend the performance.
(As readers, we are both the conductor and the orchestra, as well as the audience.)”
—
11 likes
More quotes…
We perform a book-we perform a reading of a book. We perform a book, and we attend the performance.
(As readers, we are both the conductor and the orchestra, as well as the audience.)”
