First, when a person is engrossed in literature, the mind can stay attuned to its content instead of “toxic thoughts.” Second, an understanding of the text comes not only while reading, but also when we take those thoughts with us into other mental states. We’re able to reflect on what we’ve read when we’ve turned out attentions elsewhere, even whe

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what we desperately need is to rediscover the lost art of deep reading — the type of engaged, focused reading that challenges us with complex ideas, transports us into others’ experiences and perspectives and demands our full intellectual engagement and concentration.

To me, what’s happening with teaching reading looks very much like what has happened with teaching writing, namely that we reduce something complex, human, and necessarily messy, to something smaller, discrete and oversimplified so it can be tested and measured, in order to provide comfort that we’re making “progress.”

We are courting a phenomenon k... See more

Most books are not half great and half horrible. And you should look at a few different parts of the book. But especially these days an author should be able to signal by putting some good stuff up front. Because people are less patient than they used to be. A nineteenth century book you need to give it more time, it may not get good until chapter ... See more

At present, we seem to be suffering from a widespread failure of literary imagination. We have become worse at imagining the experiences of other people, less inclined to credit these experiences as being as valid and real as our own. Why is this? In part, I think, because of the methods by, and pace at which, we acquire our stories. After all, eve... See more

In contrast to the book, the Internet incentivized a reliance on skimming, multi-tasking, superficial thinking, and short-term memory rather than deeper understanding.

When it comes to the quality of our thoughts and judgments, the amount of information a communication medium supplies is less important than the way the medium presents the information and the way, in turn, our minds take it in. The brain's capacity is not unlimited. The passageway from perception to understanding is narrow. It takes patience and c

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