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The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

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Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#41

Post by j9461701 »

jl6 wrote: post #32

Western education drills into us the mantra that reading books is virtuous. It certainly is something that children need to learn how to do, like eating and sleeping. But like eating and sleeping there are limits to the benefit you will get from reading books, and I don’t think this is widely recognised. The prevailing opinion still seems to be that reading is unreservedly Good For You. Why do I say that? Because rea…

This is something I really agree with. Both myself and my father read very often, but we read utter schlock. We are no more intellectually improving ourselves than someone watching an action movie. To think otherwise is empty self-flattering of the worst sort.

Also, at least for academic subjects, I've found doing problems is much more informative than spending the same amount of time reading the text. You can study as much python as you want, but until you sit down to write a program - you have on idea where you are.

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#42

Post by ffwacom »

StrictDabbler wrote: post #2

As I read this piece I was able to predict the direction it would go and the evidence that would be presented for each opinion. By the end I had been neither surprised nor enlightened by anything presented in it. The author likes old books, dislikes digital reading devices and audiobooks, dislikes most things written since his own birth unless they were written about the western canon or by people trained entirely in…

Oo la la, someone’s getting laid in college

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#43

Post by alexgmcm »

eksemplar wrote: post #35
shanehoban wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you were to create a list based on your readings, I'd be very interested in having a copy.

With my rant, maybe I should, though the majority of it would be Danish works as I’m Danish. Until that I can recommend Bill Gates lists, it’s a really great resource for modern international works. Some of the recommendations in gates notes are very humanitarian, but others, like Sapiens, have made it into the book shelf of most cultivated people I know and I only read it because it was recommended in gates notes.

I read A Splendid Exchange which I believe was also on his list and it was one of the best books I have ever read.

He has a good taste in books.

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#44

Post by unstuckdev »

bloat wrote: post #39
StrictDabbler wrote: post #2

As I read this piece I was able to predict the direction it would go and the evidence that would be presented for each opinion. By the end I had been neither surprised nor enlightened by anything presented in it. The author likes old books, dislikes digital reading devices and audiobooks, dislikes most things written since his own birth unless they were written about the western canon or by people trained entirely in…

I don't know how restricting yourself to the western canon makes you small minded. The western canon is, of course, huge and enormously varied. In any case, I didn't get the impression he was restricting himself. He describes going into book shops picking up any book he happened to light upon. My feeling was that he had decided not to beat himself up if these books did not encompass everything in the entire world. Af…

Conceits creep in if you only read one perspective. Think about all the people who think Western culture is the source of all civilization because they only read things that affirm that view.

Any given culture's canon is big in volume, but small in context.

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#45

Post by [deleted] »

edflsafoiewq wrote: post #17
komali2 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar thoughts here. Furthermore, the author's writing style is annoyingly old fashioned and unnecessarily long. >Like the man—the fellow with the name Solomon, writing under the pen name Ecclesiastes—said, “Of the making of many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh Why not just "Solomon, writing under the pen name 'Ecclesiastes', said..."? > I recall some years ago a politician whose n…

There always seems to be someone on HN willing to bemoan any prose style that aspires above the perfect perfunctoriness of API documentation.

[deleted]

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#46

Post by [deleted] »

ggillas wrote: post #13

The best reading breakthrough I had was to eliminate my need to complete a book. If I've lost the plot, I throw the book away. If I've got the advice author's gist, I move on. It's allowed me to enjoy reading fiction again, get to the books I need in the moment, and move faster through my reading list.

[deleted]

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#47

Post by emptyfile »

ACow_Adonis wrote: post #27
paulcole wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why not just "Solomon, writing under the pen name 'Ecclesiastes', said..."? Talk about annoyingly old fashioned and unnecessarily long. Let’s try: “Solomon aka Ecclesiastes said...”

In reply to both yours and the original post, the writer does that because he is slyly signalling to you feigned humbleness with a little wink to his readers with respect to the personage of Solomon. You know, using language for subtle humor rather than just brevity, which, if i recall correctly, he actually discussed this topic and dismisses the speed readers and those always looking for efficiency and speed: like s…

The comment you're replying to is sarcastic.

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#48

Post by EliRivers »

komali2 wrote: post #8
StrictDabbler wrote: post #2

As I read this piece I was able to predict the direction it would go and the evidence that would be presented for each opinion. By the end I had been neither surprised nor enlightened by anything presented in it. The author likes old books, dislikes digital reading devices and audiobooks, dislikes most things written since his own birth unless they were written about the western canon or by people trained entirely in…

Similar thoughts here. Furthermore, the author's writing style is annoyingly old fashioned and unnecessarily long. >Like the man—the fellow with the name Solomon, writing under the pen name Ecclesiastes—said, “Of the making of many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh Why not just "Solomon, writing under the pen name 'Ecclesiastes', said..."? > I recall some years ago a politician whose n…

Why not just "Solomon, writing under the pen name 'Ecclesiastes', said..."?

Saying "the man" and then following up with "the fellow with the name" emphasies that who he was is less important than what he said; the fact that it's Solomon, writing Ecclesiastes (two names widely recognised in the Western canon) serve to emphasise this. EVEN THOUGH it's written by someone famous in a famous book, what he wrote is STILL more important than who he was. That is part of the meaning here. There's another level to it, as well; the author is well aware that he's out on a limb here and his jovial tone makes it clear that he's not taking himself too seriously.

Stripping it down to just "Solomon, writing under the pen name 'Ecclesiastes', said..." changes the meaning.

I suppose he could have explicitly said "Here are some words written by the famous person Solomon in the famous book Ecclesiastes, but the words are more important than who he was and the book he wrote, and I'm telling you this because it makes it clear how much more important the words are than the origin of them, but don't take me too seriously on this folks!" but that seems clunky.

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#49

Post by colonelpopcorn »

unstuckdev wrote: post #44
bloat wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know how restricting yourself to the western canon makes you small minded. The western canon is, of course, huge and enormously varied. In any case, I didn't get the impression he was restricting himself. He describes going into book shops picking up any book he happened to light upon. My feeling was that he had decided not to beat himself up if these books did not encompass everything in the entire world. Af…

Conceits creep in if you only read one perspective. Think about all the people who think Western culture is the source of all civilization because they only read things that affirm that view. Any given culture's canon is big in volume, but small in context.

Still, I imagine it's better to read your culture's canon of thought only than none at all. Obviously you're not going to get a diverse perspective on life that way, but you might get a perspective that isn't totally informed by id or media.

Re: The Bookish Life: How to Read and Why

#50

Post by paulcole »

emptyfile wrote: post #47
ACow_Adonis wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In reply to both yours and the original post, the writer does that because he is slyly signalling to you feigned humbleness with a little wink to his readers with respect to the personage of Solomon. You know, using language for subtle humor rather than just brevity, which, if i recall correctly, he actually discussed this topic and dismisses the speed readers and those always looking for efficiency and speed: like s…

The comment you're replying to is sarcastic.

A good rule of thumb is to assume all of my posts are sarcastic.
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