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When I was a kid, I worked my way through our local library in an orderly fashion. I only had to be able to sign my name to get a card. When mom would drop us
by CapitalistCartr 10y ago
When I was a kid, I worked my way through our local library in an orderly fashion. I only had to be able to sign my name to get a card. When mom would drop us off for a few hours, we'd pick out our six books (the limit), she'd come get us, and before we got home, she'd chide us on already reading too many of them. We wouldn't make them last until the next visit.
It seemed an agonizing wait until 14, the required age for checking out books from the adult section. I'd read the entire children's section, so I had to wait until after school (pointless school) to read adult books at the library. By 18, I'd read about 20,000 books. Strangely, on turning 18, my reading rate dropped off a cliff.
- christudor 10y agoHow much do you read nowadays? What kind of stuff? (And have you got any recommendations in terms of fiction!?)
- CapitalistCartr 10y agoNowadays most of my reading is online, I read about a paper book per week, like most of us. My fiction is mostly SF/Fantasy. My favorite non-fiction is history, entirely predictable. I just finished 1493 last night; it was excellent. Blitzkrieg: From the Rise of Hitler to the Fall of Dunkirk before that, also good, although Len Deighton is definitely opinionated. I read HN with an eye to suggestions, which has worked out well for me.
- stinkytaco 10y agoI didn't get along very well with my sister, so when my mum went to work I went to the library instead of staying home. I was on a first name basis with most of the staff, but also revisited books many times if I particularly enjoyed them, so never got to a high number. I became a librarian in the end. I rarely read anymore, my attention span and time just don't allow it.
- vox_mollis 10y agoHow does one read that quickly with any degree of comprehension, particularly with regard to technical books? I am a fairly intelligent person, with a large vocabulary, but forcing my "mind's voice" to read faster than a normal conversational pace dramatically reduces both enjoyment and retention of material. Doubly so for anything of technical content.
- CapitalistCartr 10y agoI have no idea how; I was a little kid. I do know I didn't read with an inner voice; I read silently.
- PeterisP 10y agoI believe the enabler to fast reading is to skip verbalization totally - i.e., not a "minds voice" that is speaking quickly, but going from seeing a sentence to getting the concept of that sentence without vocalizing, without ever having had a representation of how that sentence sounds, bypassing the hearing/speech centers of your brain, reading on an abstract purely visual level. I feel a mental voice when reading e.g. poetry or when writing a draft for a presentation/speech, but all other content is purely visual. I tend to recall the visual location where a fact was written, e.g. that was on the right side of some page around the bottom part, but not how it sounded.