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

by Mortimer J. Adler

yourself from a state of understanding less to one of understanding more.

roughly define what we mean by the art of reading as follows: the process whereby a mind, with nothing to operate on but the symbols of the readable matter, and with no help from outside,I elevates itself by the power of its own operations. The mind passes from understanding less to understanding more.

distinction between reading for information and reading for understanding