Jenny (Reading Envy)'s Reviews > What We See When We Read

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.

“The openings of To the Lighthouse and Moby-Dick are confusing for the reader – we haven’t yet been given sufficient information to begin processing the narrative and its imagery.

But we are used to such confusion. All books open in doubt and dislocation.

When you first open a book, you enter a liminal space.” (60-61)

Sometimes Mendelsund muses on an idea and leaves it open for the reader to answer.

“We gulp words and phases when we read quickly, but we also may choose to savor some texts, and roll them on our tongues.

(Does the speed at which we read affect the vividness of our imagination?)” (96)

Oh hey I EVEN discussed this book on Episode 057 of the Reading Envy Podcast, and still completely forgot to post about it here.