Great Ideas; 33; Learning from Books: How to Read a Book

. . . . . The great idea is a program devoted to uncovering the meaning, the ideas we all use every day of our lives. In the period to follow, Dr. Mortimer-Hee Adler will undertake to discuss some aspects of a basic idea, Dr. Adler. Mr. Luckman and I welcome you to another discussion of the great idea. Today, as we continue with the subject of learning, we shall consider how we can learn from books,

or in other words, reading as a form of learning. Mr. Luckman is here to ask me questions. Questions of the soft that may arise in your mind as the discussion proceeds. We have seen that all genuine learning is active, not passive. No one, not even the best teacher, can help us to learn anything, unless we ourselves make the primary effort to learn. Now, when most of us think of teachers helping us learn, we think of another person, not even being in the same room with us, talking to us, showing us something, or giving us some sort of directions. But certainly teaching may take other forms. All teaching involves language and symbols, some form of communication between men, and hence the written word in the form of books and documents may function as a means of teaching just as much as the spoken word.

In fact, I think I say that the process of learning in the course of reading books is essentially the same as the process of learning in the course of listening to lectures. In fact, the art of reading and the art of listening are very much alike. Well, I think everyone can see, Dr. Adler, and I think they'll agree, too, that when one man teaches another or an individual learns from another, that communication is necessarily involved. In fact, the only kind of learning that doesn't involve a process of communication is that which you've described and yourself have called pure learning or unated discovery, where a man learns something entirely by himself through observation and through full. That's so far so good. But one thing really isn't clear to me, and that is that books and lectures really aren't the only forms of communication by which one teaches or by which one learns from another.

Are they? No, Mr. Lefford. They're not. There are other forms. For example, when two men sit down to discuss a subject in which both are very deeply interested and both have some confidence, the chances are very good, that they will learn something from that discussion. And what is true of that discussion, two men with one another, is equally true, I think, maybe more true of a formal discussion in which a large group of people participate. Now, the problem of learning in such situations is quite different from the problem of learning by from books and by reading books. Hence, I should like to devote next time in this series of discussions or considerations of learning to the whole problem of how we learn, how we can learn by and from discussion with our fellow men. But language isn't the only means of communication.

Pictures also serve, and sometimes more effectively than words. And the combination of pictures and words is perhaps the most effective means of communication. In addition to that, it is certainly the most popular means of communication in the 20th century. Think of it. The picture magazine, the motion picture, and now last but not least television. Therefore, I should like to devote the last session of this series of programs on learning to the consideration of whether and how we can learn from the combination of pictures and words, whether on the motion picture or on the television screen. Well, it's going to be very interesting indeed to hear what the author of How to Read a Book has to say about how to learn from television. Although, when you wrote How to Read a Book, Dr. Adler, that you never dreamed you'd be doing just this, that you say you're going to do.

If I think I can remember some really unkind remarks you made about all such things as going to the movies or listening to the radio and contrast from reading a really good book. You've got me. But that was 15 years ago. And times have changed. And so have I. Remember my motto? Yes. Never too old to learn. Well, times have changed. And I think I've changed some respect. But there's one thing about which I have not changed my mind. And that is the importance of reading as a form of learning. No, have I changed my mind about how to read a book in order to learn in the process of reading books? Now, that's what I want to talk about today, the whole business of how we learn by reading. And I think perhaps the best way to begin is to consider with you the different kinds of reading. Because certainly we do not do all our reading, simply to learn.

And many of the things we read are the things we read are not all equally serviceable as means of learning. So let's consider the different kinds of learning. Well, this can be plus and two, cabbage. Reading that can be serious and learning serious, but it doesn't have to be grim. No, but let me first deal with the kinds of reading. And then let's consider whether pleasure is involved in all of them. All right. The first division which I should like to present is a perfectly obvious one I think to all of us. We either read for pleasure and relaxation on the one hand or we read for learning on the other. Now, there's not much that we want to have to say about reading for pleasure. We all do it just as we all play games, go to the theatre, listen to the radio, watch television in order to pass the time and get some amusement or entertainment. Sometimes learning does happen accidentally or incidentally in the course of such reading for pleasure.

But precisely because it is not intentional, we cannot consider any rules for such learning. One can't make it happen by the development of any skill. Now, the other kind of reading is where our intention is to learn something. And as Mr. Luckman indicated a moment ago, this kind of reading where our intention is to learn something may of course involve some fun, maybe plus. But I don't want to give learning a full boost by saying what some people do say learning is always fun. It isn't always fun. Sometimes learning is hard work. In fact, it is quite often that and in my own experience, it is usually the case that when the process of learning is itself somewhat painful, the end result tends to be more profitable. Though learning is not always fun and though reading may involve some work when reading is for the sake of learning, all reading is not equally difficult.

There is an easier form of reading for learning and a harder form. Let me make a distinction now between these two forms. The first of these is reading for the sake of information where our aim is to acquire some knowledge of facts. We all do this kind of reading when we read newspapers or guide books, magazine articles or simple historical accounts of past and current events. In fact, what in this country we mean by a literate person is a person who can do just this kind of reading. That isn't a very high standard literacy but that's what we mean when we talk about the literate electorate or the literate population of the United States. People who can read at the level of reading magazines or newspapers for the sake of information.

Now the harder and much more profitable kinds of reading, I should like to distinguish from reading for information by calling it reading for enlightenment. Where our purpose is not to know some more facts but to understand ideas, to increase our understanding. Now here there is a problem and I think there is no problem about reading for information because this kind of reading reading for enlightenment is difficult to do. And not many people are able to do it at least not very well, even among all those who would regard themselves and would be called by others literate persons. The reason for this is that this kind of reading, reading for enlightenment is not taught in our schools or at least not taught very well in our schools. Though in my judgment there is nothing more important that our schools could do if our schools have as a main function, the preparation of young people to go on with a life of adult learning after they've left school.

Now you've touched me on a very, very sore spot because I'm a teacher at the college level and I must confess that you're right. The students we get simply don't know how to read and is at least not well enough certainly to get enlightened as opposed to information out of what they're reading. And I'm afraid the worst of it is too that there isn't very much we do in our colleges to help these students improve their ability to read for enlightenment in college. Now my guess is that the problem is that we don't keep this distinction that you've just made continuously in our mind so that when we've completed the job as we do in grade school and teach them to read for information, it stops right there. Now I'd like to hear what you have to say a little more detail on this problem of reading for enlightenment. Before I do what Mr. Luckman asks, expound more fully what I mean by reading for enlightenment, let me comment briefly on the remarks he has just made.

I think he's right that our schools think they've done enough when they've taught children in the early grades, the simple kind of reading for information, the kind of reading that involves reading newspapers, magazines, or even the textbooks they use in school for the textbooks or books which are written so that they are not very difficult to read in order to get from them, the information the students have to memorize to pass back to teachers. Now the other kind of reading, reading for enlightenment, I think could not be taught in the grades where at the present time most reading is taught. We might guess that the kind of reading I'm now talking about reading for enlightenment would have to be taught in college, would have to be one of the main things we teach in college. And in my judgment, colleges would do well if they did this primarily, if our college graduates were able to exhibit, to use the skill of reading in this way.

Now to make this point clear, to make this point clear, let me do what Mr. Luckman asked and what you may be interested in hearing me do, explain precisely what I mean by reading for enlightenment. I think the most direct way I can do that is to present you with a series of alternatives. Let's begin with the fact that here you are sitting in your own room with a book in your hand. Now then let's take the first alternative. Either this book you have in your hand is a book which, as you read it, you understand perfectly and immediately with no difficulty or you don't understand it. Now in the first all alternative, if you understand this book perfectly and immediately as you read it page after page, there is no problem of reading for you. Nor, by the way, will the book be a help you to learn, for if you can understand it that readily and quickly and perfectly, you cannot increase your understanding by reading that book.

Hence, let's take the other alternative, the alternative in which you don't understand it that way. Now here again, there are two alternatives. Either you can't understand it at all, really can't understand it at all, in which case there is nothing one can do or you can understand it somewhat. Let us say that you understand it just enough to know that you do not understand it at all, that there is more there for you to try to grasp, try to come to understand. Now it's in this alternative, this last case that we have a problem and there are just three things that you can do in this condition. The first one is to give up, just to give up, either because you do not want to make the effort of reading that will be called upon to make or because you do not know how to make that effort. The second thing you can do is almost as bad as that. You can go to someone else and ask them to explain the book to you.

Of my guess that this can't be done very well because you can understand their explanation, you can understand the book also. And if they did succeed in explaining the book to you, you wouldn't have learned to read. What the third thing you can do, the third thing is sitting with this book and by yourself a book that is somewhat over your head, you lift yourself up by your acts and art of reading from a state of understanding less to a state of understanding more. Now that, that seems to me, is the definition of reading for enlightenment. And with that definition I can give you a simple test to let you know where you can tell with you how much skill of the thought you have. Learning, the kind of learning that is most important for adults to do, consists mainly in acquiring insights and increasing or decreasing their understanding.

And this can be done by reading. If with a book that is over your head you can lift yourself up from a state of understanding less to a state of understanding more. But remember, this books that are over your head don't lift you up as it were by capillary attraction. You can't sit back and just expect to be uplifted by a book that is over your head simply by gazing at it. You have to work, you have to exert some skill, you have to climb up hand over hand as it were on the ropes of learning. Now here then, here then is the test. Here is a good sign, but which you can tell whether you have this skill. When you are faced by the challenge of a book that is over your head which you know that you do not understand well enough and try to understand more, what can you do to solve the problem? How many things do you know how to do that will succeed in making that book clearer and more intelligible to you?

Well, are you going to give us the answer to that question? Yes. At this very moment. At this very moment. The answer to that question of course consists in a statement of the basic rules of reading of the author reading. Before I state the rules themselves that remind you of one thing. You must perhaps preliminary all the rules. The most important thing about reading is about learning generally is that it must be active, not passive. Now, this shouldn't be too hard to understand, but most people tend to think that writing is active or that talking is active and that reading and listening are passive. But just think of a baseball game for a moment. Is catching the ball any less active than pitching it? Well, attaching is no less active than pitching than neither is reading or listening any less active than writing or talking.

Now, what do I mean by active reading, by doing active reading? I mean simply this, that you stay awake while reading. And when I say stay awake, I don't mean simply keep your eyes open while your mind goes to sleep. How do you keep awake while reading? The answer to that question in a nutshell is by asking questions, by asking yourself questions about the book and asking the book questions for the author to answer. The difference between active and passive reading is unmistakable. The signs I think of it, again, would not let you ever make a mistake as to what you were doing, active or passive reading.

But one thing, when you read actively, you really have fatigue, some fatigue. Work is involved, where work is involved with opposed to play, you suffer fatigue. If after reading a book for an hour or two, you aren't at all tired, then you are not reading actively in this sense. And there's another sign of reading actively, pencil and paper work, making notes, mocking the book, mocking the margin, underlining parts. This is my best test of whether I'm reading actively or not. And I think I could show you this. I have on the shelf here some books that I read a long time ago. And I think if I took one off the shelf, I would be able to see it once that many years ago I read that book actively. Let me see if I can find it. Here is one. Here's a book that I read in college. William James' pragmatism. And it's torn a little bit and yellow over the ears and here. In the front of the book are notes that I made while reading the book.

The pages are torn and yellow, at least 25 years ago. But these notes indicate that when I read the book, I read it away, not asleep. And now that I look through the book itself, I find pages in which I have marked in the margins and written on these margins as well. Pages like that that indicate I was thinking and asking questions as I read the book. I don't remember when I read it. It's at least 25 years ago. But I do know from these signs that when I did read it, I read it quite actively. So let me come back again. I said that to read actively, you must read by asking questions. What question? Well, the answer to that, I think, is not too hard. There are just three main questions one can ask. So they'll be broken down in the supported form. Let me show you what they are. I have them here in this chart. The three main questions are, what is the whole book about? And how are its parts written in that whole? Second one is, what in detail does the book say? And what does the author mean by what he says?

And the third question is, is it true? And what other? And how to read a book? Didn't you give three sets of rules for reading a book three times or at least three different ways? Are those sets of rules related to these three main questions that the reader should ask in order to keep himself awake while reading? They are. The three sets of rules in how to read a book are directions for answering the three main questions that I just read to you from the chart. That here in how to read a book on two pages are all the rules divided into three sets. The first set being the rules for analyzing the structure of a book. The second set being the rules for interpreting the content of the book. The third set being the rules for criticizing the book with regard to its proof and its significance. Now, let's talk about the rules themselves. Here are the first set of rules. Let's read them together. Perhaps I can comment briefly on one or two of the rules.

These are the book rules that tell you how to find out what the whole book is about and how its parts are related. First rule is to classify the book according to the kind of book it is and the kind of subject matter it has. Second rule is to summarize the whole book as briefly as possible in your own words. The third is to see its major parts in their order and relation to one another. And the fourth is to define the problem or problems the author is trying to solve. Now, let's consider that first and second rule for a moment. Let me see if I can illustrate how they operate. In order to tell what kind of a book it is, you must be able to use certain signs in the book, the title of the book, the subtitle, the table of content, often the author's preface, often the opening sentences of the book tell you the kind of the book it is and what it is about. But you must also have in your mind a number of basic categories. You must know the distincting's poetry and history, the different kinds of history, the different kinds of poetry,

and how these differ from science and philosophy, how politics and economic differ. So that as you read the book, the general categories of subject matter become significant for you in understanding what the book is about. Now, as for summarizing a large and difficult book, it can be done. Many people think that it's too difficult to do, but it really isn't. And sometimes the author does it for you. As here, for example, Herodotus, who wrote the great history of the war between the Greeks and the Persians in his very opening sentence, summarizes the whole book. He says, these are the histories of Herodotus in order that the actions of men may not be faced by time, nor the great and wondrous deeds displayed by Greeks and barbarians be deprived of their renown. And for the rest, for what cause they wade the war upon one another. Well, let me get you another example.

Aristotle's ethics is a difficult and elaborate book. And here, briefly, in my own words, is a summary of what that whole book is about, which grasps what the whole is. It is an inquiry into the nature of human happiness and an analysis of the conditions under which happiness may be gained or lost with an indication of what men must do in their conduct and thinking in order to become happy or to avoid unhappiness. The principal emphasis being placed on the cultivation of the virtues, moral and intellectual, although other necessarily good, are also recognized as wealth, health, friends, and a just society in which to live. Now, let me go on to the next set of rules, the second set of rules. These are rules about the interpretation of a book's content. And here, you must first come to terms with the author by interpreting his basic words. Secondly, you must discover the sentences that state his major propositions. Third, you must find the argument by which he tries to support these propositions. And finally, you must determine which of his problems the author saw and which he did not saw.

Now, these rules of reading would be unnecessary if language were a perfect meeting of communication, if language brought you into immediate contact, your mind, into immediate contact with the thought of the author. But unfortunately, languages are far from perfect meeting of communication. It is much more like a mountain barrier between author and reader. The mountain barrier, both of them, must tunnel through if they are going to meet and have some coming to terms or meeting of mind. It won't do just to have the author do the tunneling toward you. You must know how the journal tunnel taught him. And all these rules are rules of which guide you in tunneling toward the author and your understanding of what he made. Now, I'm not going to discuss the third set of rules because the third set of rules that deal with talking back to the author and criticizing the book for its truth and significance are really rules for discussion between the reader and the author. And I shall treat these rules next time when we consider how one learns by discussion.

This third set of rules will be useful for us as we consider a whole problem of learning by discussion. Now, in the time that is left, I should like to add two further comments on all these rules of reading, reading for enlightenment. The first is that it's much easier to read a good book than a bad one because the author of a good book is himself a man who knows how to read well and therefore writes his book in a manner that makes it readable well according to these basic rules. The second point is that there are not a large number of books worth reading this way, but the whole point of reading for enlightenment is not the number of books you read but how well you read them. Abraham Lincoln read only a few books but he read them very well. And the English philosopher Thomas Hobb said, if I read as many books as most men do, I would be as dull with it as they are. The only books to read in this way are the books that are over your head. And that, by the way, is a definition of a great book.

The great books are the books that are worth everybody's reading because they're over everybody's head all over time. Well, doesn't the average person that will need some help in reading these great books? Yes, the average person does need some help. And one of the greatest helps in reading these books is discussion, the discussion of the book between you and other persons who have read the same book. But this is something we shall deal with next time when we deal with how we learn by and from discussion. Well, I hope they're subject to interest you. As we witness again next time, thank you very much. Thank you.