How to Read a Book: the classic guide to intelligent reading

by Mortimer J. Adler

You do not understand the book perfectly. Let us even assume—what unhappily is not always true—that you understand enough to know that you do not understand it all. You know the book has more to say than you understand and hence that it contains something that can increase your understanding.

may increase our store of information, but they cannot improve our understanding, for our understanding was equal to them before we started.

a person tries to read something that at first he does not completely understand.

What are the conditions under which this kind of reading—reading for understanding—takes place?

there is initial inequality in understanding.

the reader must be able to overcome this inequality in some degree, seldom perhaps fully, but always approaching equality with the writer.

In short, we can learn only from our “betters.” We must know who they are and how to learn from them.

To be informed is to know simply that something is the case. To be enlightened is to know, in addition, what it is all about: why it is the case, what its connections are with other facts, in what respects it is the same, in what respects it is different, and so forth.

Enlightenment is achieved only when, in addition to knowing what an author says, you know what he means and why he says it.

learning by instruction

learning by discovery.

Instruction occurs when one person teaches another through...

discovery—the process of learning something by research, by investigation, or by reflection, without being taught.

The difference between learning by instruction and learning by discovery—or,

primarily a difference in the materials on which the learner works.

The art of reading, in short, includes all of the same skills that are involved in the art of unaided discovery: keenness of observation, readily available memory, range of imagination, and, of course, an intellect trained in analysis and reflection.

The first level of reading we will call Elementary Reading.

The second level of reading we will call Inspectional Reading. It is characterized by its special emphasis on time.

another name for this level might be skimming or pre-reading.

The third level of reading we will call Analytical Reading.

analytical reading is the best and most complete reading that is possible given unlimited time.

The analytical reader must ask many, and organized, questions of what he is reading.

The fourth and highest level of reading we will call Syntopical Reading.

Another name for this level might be comparative reading.

With the help of the books read, the syntopical reader is able to construct an analysis of the subject that may not be in any of the books.

there are at least four more or less clearly distinguishable stages in the child’s progress toward what is called mature reading ability.

The first stage is known by the term “reading readiness.”

In the second stage, children learn to read very simple materials.

The third stage is characterized by rapid progress in vocabulary building and by increasing skill in “unlocking” the meaning of unfamiliar words through context clues.

Finally, the fourth stage is characterized by the refinement and enhancement of the skills previously acquired.

You may discover that what you get from skimming is all the book is worth to you for the time being.

In tackling a difficult book for the first time, read it through without ever stopping to look up or ponder the things you do not understand right away.

Ask questions while you read—questions that you yourself must try to answer in the course of reading.

WHAT IS THE BOOK ABOUT AS A WHOLE?

WHAT IS BEING SAID IN DETAIL, AND HOW?

IS THE BOOK TRUE, IN WHOLE OR PART?

WHAT OF IT?

remember to ask them as you read.

Full ownership of a book only comes when you have made it a part of yourself, and the best way to make yourself a part of it—which comes to the same thing—is by writing in it.

VERTICAL LINES AT THE MARGIN—to

It would be great for Kindle books to allow for notes without highlighting, or to support doodles in the margins

The questions answered by inspectional reading are: first, what kind of book is it? second, what is it about as a whole? and third, what is the structural order of the work whereby the author develops his conception or understanding of that general subject matter?

Now there is no other way of forming a habit of operation than by operating.

Knowing the rules of an art is not the same as having the habit.

RULE 1. YOU MUST KNOW WHAT KIND OF BOOK YOU ARE READING, AND YOU SHOULD KNOW THIS AS EARLY IN THE PROCESS AS POSSIBLE, PREFERABLY BEFORE YOU BEGIN TO READ.

An expository book is one that conveys knowledge primarily, “knowledge” being construed broadly.

recognize that there are various kinds of expository books.

Reading the title, in other words, could have given them essential information about the book before they started to read it; but they had failed to do that, as most people fail to do even with an unfamiliar book.

In other words, this rule has to be made a little more intelligible if you are to follow it intelligently. It can only be made intelligible by drawing distinctions and thus creating categories that make sense and will stand up to the test of time.

between knowledge and action as the two ends a writer may have in mind.

intelligent action depends on knowledge.