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How We Read: Tales, Fury, Nothing, Sound
What do we do when we read?
Reading can be an act of consumption or an act of creation. Our “work reading” overlaps with our “pleasure reading,” and yet these two modes of reading engage with different parts of the self. It is sometimes passive, sometimes active, and can even be an embodied form.
The contributors to this volume share their own histories of reading in order to reveal the shared pleasure that lies in this most solitary of acts – which is also, paradoxically, the act of most complete plenitude. Many of the contributors engage in academic writing, and several publish in other genres, including poetry and fiction; some contributors maintain an active online presence. All are engaged with reading’s capacity to stimulate and excite as well as to frustrate and confuse. The synergies and tensions of online reading and print reading animate these thirteen contributions, generating a sense of shared community. Together, the authors open their libraries to us. This is how we read.
Reading can be an act of consumption or an act of creation. Our “work reading” overlaps with our “pleasure reading,” and yet these two modes of reading engage with different parts of the self. It is sometimes passive, sometimes active, and can even be an embodied form.
The contributors to this volume share their own histories of reading in order to reveal the shared pleasure that lies in this most solitary of acts – which is also, paradoxically, the act of most complete plenitude. Many of the contributors engage in academic writing, and several publish in other genres, including poetry and fiction; some contributors maintain an active online presence. All are engaged with reading’s capacity to stimulate and excite as well as to frustrate and confuse. The synergies and tensions of online reading and print reading animate these thirteen contributions, generating a sense of shared community. Together, the authors open their libraries to us. This is how we read.
186 pages, ebook
Published January 1, 2019
1 person is currently reading
20 people want to read
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
July 27, 2021
a gentle reminder that being 6 books behind on my goodreads reading goal does not take away from my self worth :) a really lovely collection of essays by cool people who study medieval times and have some great things to say about how we read. there is a special intimacy in reading out loud. we can embody words through movement. returning to text is surprisingly revelatory. there's no one way to read and we can make reading our own.
i liked this especially (heller is referencing king arthur narratives and agrees that the critics are right):
"There is no king because the king is the shield; the king is the grail. The king is the story. The story is only sleeping. The story will return."
i liked this especially (heller is referencing king arthur narratives and agrees that the critics are right):
"There is no king because the king is the shield; the king is the grail. The king is the story. The story is only sleeping. The story will return."
Displaying 1 of 1 review