How to Read a Book by Mortimer J. Adler and Charles van Doren

PUBLISHER: Touchstone, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

PUBLISHED: September, 2014 (first published in 1940, revised and re-published August 15, 1972)

FORMAT: paperback

PAGES: 430 pages

GENRE: non-fiction

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SYNOPSIS (from Goodreads): "How to Read a Book, originally published in 1940, has become a rare phenomenon, a living classic. It is the best and most successful guide to reading comprehension for the general reader. And now it has been completely rewritten and updated.

You are told about the various levels of reading and how to achieve them – from elementary reading, through systematic skimming and inspectional reading, to speed reading, you learn how to pigeonhole a book, X-ray it, extract the author's message, criticize. You are taught the different reading techniques for reading practical books, imaginative literature, plays, poetry, history, science and mathematics, philosophy and social science.

Finally, the authors offer a recommended reading list and supply reading tests whereby you can measure your own progress in reading skills, comprehension and speed."

WHAT TO LEARN: This manual about reading to understand, not just to retain information, is split into four parts. They also argue that thinking comes from reading, not the distractions of everyday media we have right now. Part I: The Dimensions of Reading, introduces the reader to active reading and the first two of four levels of reading: Elementary level and Inspectional level. The reader should strive to be actively engaged with the text rather than surfing for information to cram. It is the first step towards understanding its propositions and/or arguments. Part II: The Third Level of Reading: Analytical Reading, contains the bulk of the book. Analytical reading is intended to be a crucial tool for readers by learning to understand authors' arguments. This section covers what it means to discover unity in a text with steps like how those parts of a whole form said unity, coming to terms, and criticizing the work, to name a few. Part III: Approaches to Different Kinds of Reading Matter, brings home another point leading back to understanding a book: every book should be read by its genre respectively. It gives examples within chronotropic (history), theoretical (mathematics/sciences), and practical (philosophical) reads of how to apply the fifteen rules of analytical reading to these different works. Part IV: The Ultimate Goals of Reading, discusses the fourth level of reading, Syntopical. All this is is learning to bring multiple texts together, understanding arguments quickly, and learning to have authors come to terms with your propositions and arguments. Students do this all the time when having to write their research papers and theses.

REVIEW: How to Read a Book was very enlightening for me. I've wanted to try and dive into books that would challenge me intellectually for a long time, but have been too apprehensive about wasting time not understanding what I read. This book has inspired me to challenge my reading ability. Reading books over my head is the whole point of reading for understanding. I'll also grow as a person because of striving to earn understanding.

"The books that you will want to practice your reading on, particularly your analytical reading, must also make demands on you. They must seem to you to be beyond your capacity." - p. 330

I also really appreciate the authors' takes on imaginative literature. They make sure to say that there is nothing wrong with fiction. It is written through experiences, thus the beauty of the book is primarily a subjective experience. Keep in mind, though, that the only thing to bring into fiction from the four levels of reading are the four main questions: 1) What is it about as a whole? 2) What is being said and how? 3) Is it true? 4) What of it? Remember: it is up to you how much you choose to understand.

Down sides: the rhetoric is sometimes unnecessarily repetitive and they only use he/him pronouns to describe readers and authors. Considering this was first printed in 1940 and revised for re-publishing in 1972, neither of these things are surprising.

Rating: 4/5 stars!