by Austin Vail

Created on: January 31, 2007   Last Updated: May 08, 2007

Reading seems such a common thing, doesn't it? We all know how to read, so why read any book about reading other than those that we encountered in grade school?

Two books on this subject, How to Read a Book by Adler and Van Doren, and Reading like a Writer by Prose address the premise that most people don't know how to read very well. We skim or take in the surface without ever plumbing the depths. We miss important things that authors try to accomplish as a result.

Francine Prose is a highly published author and teaches writing at the college level, so if anyone should know what reading like a writer involves, she's the one. Her book is full of literature examples, which isn't surprising, but how she has arranged the examples with her insights is. For every overworked cliche about the writing craft, such as show and not tell, she comes up with great literature that contradicts until her ultimate conclusion is that there are no rules that aren't broken. Beginning writers need rules, but the rules themselves are temporary aids to understanding how a writer applies the craft and creates art. Once a certain mastery is achieved, the rules can, and maybe should, be broken.

Reading Like a Writer has a subtitle: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them. Prose loves good books, and she explains how this love developed from childhood on up. She also mentions briefly how her writing career developed and why, interesting stories for those wanting to become published authors. But mostly this book is about loving great literature perhaps more so than ever imagined possible.

How to Read a Book is an older work, originally published in the 1940s and updated in the early 1970s. The message is that reading involves levels and questions that need to be answered for each level. Some of the reading techniques might be familiar, such as making notations in the margins and marking the text in various ways, as one studies a subject. We often pick up these techniques through osmosis in high school and college, but probably not all of them. This book is a fine reference for these techniques, and with modern sticky notes and arrows, the reader doesn't need to damage any good book while coming to understand it.

The authors emphasize that intensive reading should only be done with good books. Don't waste your time with anything less. Also, if a good book is not over your head, there's little chance that you'll learn anything new. How to Read a Book concentrates on expository writing and includes sections for fiction, history, science, mathematics and others.

Both books include recommended reading lists. Some titles, such as Don Quixote, are in both lists. I've found that by reading these two books back-to-back and referring to them every so often, I can tackle anything that's been published and identify good books more quickly with a quick scan, even if not on either list. I'm learning how to read as a pro and loving it.

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