How to Read a Book

How to Read a Book - By Mortimer Adler

ISBN: 9780671212094
Date Read: 2024-07-21
How Strongly I Recommend It: 5/5
(See my list of 8+ books, for more.)

How to Read a Book by Mortimer Adler is a classic. I would consider it the complementary book to On Writing Well by William Zinsser. Adler breaks down reading in ways that are easy to understand, and practical. For example, the Chapters on Inspectional Reading really gave me the freedom to decide whether a book is worth my time. Before I would have thought that all books need to be read thoroughly. But Adler taught me that not all books are created equal and not all books are the same for different people. I wish I had read this book earlier than I did and I believe that this book would bring value to anyone.

My Notes

Part 1: The Dimensions of Reading

1. The Activity and Art of Reading

Active Reading

Some people read books better than other, and it depends on how well they process or how much effort they put in.

Reading is like catching a ball in baseball.

The pitcher/hitter initiates
The catcher catches
A better pitcher/thrower will have balls that are easier to catch
A better catcher is able to receive different types of throws
A ball is a simple object, but a book is a complex object where the reader can catch partial of the book

Good communication is the responsibility of both the writer and the reader.

The Goal of Reading: Reading for Information and Reading for Understanding

You should read to increase your understanding. This happens when 1) the book contains higher level of understanding 2) the reader works to understand it.

Reading as Learning: The Difference Between Learning by Instruction and Learning by Discovery

Read to understand why things are the way they are, not just to be informed

To be informed is to know facts, to be enlightened is to know why it is the case. The former is able to recite, the latter is able to teach.

To read widely and to be well-read are different things.

2. The Levels of Reading

Four levels of reading
1. Elementary
  - What does the sentence say etc.
  - Most people have to learn this when they’re learning a new language
2. Inspectional
  - What is the book about? (given limited time)
  - Systematic skimming and Superficial Reading
3. Analytical
  - Chewing and digesting the book.
  - What is the book about? (given unlimited time)
4. Syntopical
  - How does this book compare with other book of the same topic?

3. The First Level of Reading: Elementary Reading

The first level of reading is just basic reading skills. Most people can do this.

Ability to see and hear
Ability to make sounds
Ability to work with others
Ability to recognize words
Ability to read in context

4. The Second Level of Reading: Inspectional Reading

There are two steps/skills involved in this level of reading
Though a good reader do these two simultaneously, splitting it in two helps with explanation

There is a lot of book out there, and there is too little time to go through all of them. In this level of reading you are to figure out if the book is worth reading analytically or not.

Inspectional Reading 1: Systematic Skimming or Pre-reading

Skim the book to know if the book is worth an Analytical Reading.
Read the title, subtitle, the preface, the Table of Content
See what topics are covered, and check out some passages reference by the big topics. And check out what other works has been cited
Check out the blurb at the back of the book.
- If the blurb doesn’t say much maybe the book doesn’t say much either
Skim what you think are the pivotal chapters
- Skim a few paragraph, or maybe several pages in sequence (never more than that).
Read the epilogue or last 2-3 pages, as author often sums up with why their work is new and important
Though out this process: decide whether or not you want to read the book.

Inspectional Reading 2: Superficial Reading

A quick read through to get the big picture, get what you do understand. Then on you second time go back to those that you struggle on (or not).
Don’t stop to ponder or tackle the things that you don’t understand. It’s easier for you to understand on your second time reading it.

On Reading Speeds

Some books do not deserve a fast reading, some books do. Know when to read at different speeds so you can read it with comprehension.

Scan your eyes across to match your mind. Your mind can read faster than your eyes.

5 How to be a Demanding Reader

An active reader asks these questions when they read:

What is the book about as a whole?
What is being said in detail, and how?
Is the book true, in whole or part? (You can’t answer this until you answer the first two)
What of it? So what?

How to Make a Book Your Own

Writing is thinking, if you can’t express what you’re thinking, you’re not thinking enough.
Reading a book should be a conversation between you and the author

Some suggested nomenclature:

Underline: major points; important or forceful statements
Vertical lines at the margin: emphasize a statement, or a passage too long to be underlined
Star, asterisk, or other doodad at the margin: emphasize the ten dozen most important statements or passages in the book
Numbers in the margin: indicate a sequence of points made by the author in developing an argument
numbers of other pages in the margin: reference other places the author makes the same points, or contradictions (Cf)
Circling of key words or phrases: same as underlining
writing in the margin: to record questions, to summarize a complicated statement,

The Three Kinds of Note-making

Inspection Reading (Structural Note)
- What kind of book is it?
- What is it about as a whole?
- What is the structural order of the work whereby the author develops his conception or understanding of that general subject matter?
Inspection Reading (Conceptual)
- Ideas
Syntopical Reading (Shape of Discussion/ Dialectical)
- A concept engaged by multiple books/authors on the same subject

Forming the Habit of Reading

You have to practice until following the “rules” of reading becomes automatic. Focus on one rule at a time until you can put them together without thinking.

Part 2: The Third Level of Reading: Analytical Reading

6 Pigeonholing a Book

The Importance of Classifying a Book

[!NOTE] Rule 1 YOU MUST KNOW WHAT KIND OF BOOK YOU ARE READING, AND YOU SHOULD KNOW THIS AS EARLY IN THE PROCESS AS POSSIBLE PREFERABLY BEFORE YOU BEGIN TO READ

This should be done during Inspectional Reading

What You Can Learn From the Title of a Book

The title can usually tell you what the book is about, as with Inspectional Reading
You also need to know how to classify a book (non-fiction, fiction)
To classify you need to know the different types of classification

Practical vs. Theoretical Books

Practical books tells you how to do something, what you should believe it. It tries to persuade you. Practical doesn’t necessarily means it is correct.

Theoretical books are concerned on whether something is true.

Practical on the so what? If one idea is true.

Theoretical uses “is”. Something is true. And practical uses “should” and “ought”. One way is better than another.

Practical books also contain theoretical elements

Kinds of Theoretical Books

Historical
- Chronicle
- Talks about events in a certain place at a certain time
- narrative
Science
- Seeks to answer general rules or laws
- Experiments from labs
Philosophy
- Seeks general truth, but done by asking different questions and using different methods than scientific books
- Uses experiences that is common to ordinary people

7 X-Raying a Book

[!NOTE] Rule Two of Analytical Reading STATE THE UNITY OF THE WHOLE BOOK IN A SINGLE SENTENCE, OR AT MOST A FEW SENTENCES (A SHORT PARAGRAPH)

[!NOTE] Rule Three SET FORTH THE MAJOR PARTS OF THE BOOK, AND SHOW HOW THESE ARE ORGANIZED INTO A WHOLE, BY BEING ORDERED TO ONE ANOTHER AND TO THE UNITY OF THE WHOLE

A book is like a house with rooms (that are independant) and hallways connecting them. Without each part and connection a house wouldn’t be as livable
A good book has a well planned out “floor plan”

Of Plots and Plans: Stating the Unity of a Book

Different people will have different summaries of a book. Book means different thing to different people
Difference in how comprehensive and how concise one wants to be
The author sometimes helps to give the unity of an expository work
a good story is one where you can see a unity in the story and all the parts dresses and sets the story apart
it is the reader’s responsibility to find the unity of the book

Mastering the Multiplicity: The Art of Outlining a Book

The different parts that the author builds to support the unity of the book
You only have to approximate an outline. Since no book reverse so much effort and time is finite. And no book is can be perfectly divided into its parts
Make your own outline to read well. Even if the author already outlined it for you
The work you do in Rule Three should support your claim in Rule Two

The Reciprocal Arts of Reading and Writing

Rule Two and Three are used by writer as well. Though the author starts off with the skeleton and then covers it up.

Discovering the Author’s Intentions

[!NOTE] Rule Four FIND OUT WHAT THE AUTHOR’S PROBLEMS WERE.

Why did the author write the book?
What questions they are trying to answer? What are primary and secondary questions? Which should be answered first?

The First Stage of Analytical Reading

The Four rules helps you achieve the first stage of analytical reading. Understanding it’s structure.
Don’t let “stage” make you think it’s done chronological a good reader does these all the time. Though you usually want to get the structure in the beginning

8. Coming to Terms with An Author

Words vs. Terms

Words can have different meaning. The writer and reader have to come to “term” with each other. The writer writes in an unambiguous manner.
The reader have to read the word meaning the same thing as the writer when he writes, for communication to happen
Communication, there has to be something common for it to happen
Poetry is different in that good poetry have intentionally ambiguous words

[!NOTE] Rule Five Find The Important Words and Through Them Come to Terms with the Author

Find the important words
Understand the meaning of those words

The second stage of Analytical reading Focuses on the Content

Finding the KeyWords

Some words are more important than others in a book
Some words are used ordinarily so you will have no trouble understanding what the author meant
But for old books, the ordinary meaning might have changed as time passed
From the reader’s viewpoint, the words that gives them the most trouble are (likely) the “important words”
But if you already understood what the author mean by the important words, you have already come to term with the author and you have no more work to do

Technical Words and Special Vocabularies

The author may help by focusing on certain words
By knowing the subject of the book, you can find the important words through the technical words of that subject
Most philosophers have very technical words that are not ordinary, and they sometimes take ordinary words and make them technical

Finding the Meaning

You find the meaning of a word through it’s context (other words that you do understand)
A word can have many meaning and many words can share one meaning (term)

9 Determining An Author’s Message

Understanding what main points the author is making
In Inspectional Reading you go from top down
In Analytical Reading you go bottom up and they meat at the propositions/points being made by the author

Sentences vs Propositions

RULE 5. FIND THE IMPORTANT WORDS AND COME TO TERMS.

RULE 6. MARK THE MOST IMPORTANT SENTENCES IN A BOOK AND DISCOVER THE PROPOSITIONS THEY CONTAIN.

[!NOTE] RULE 7 LOCATE OR CONSTRUCT THE BASIC ARGUMENTS IN THE BOOK BY FINDING THEM IN THE CONNECTION OF SENTENCES.

Sentences and propositions are not one to one like words and terms

Finding the Key Sentence

Like for important words the sentences that most puzzle you are likely the important ones
Spend more time on the important sentences, or else all sentences are unimportant
The important should support the main idea of the book that the author is making

Finding the Propositions

Understanding the words (come to terms) used into he sentence
The various meanings withing the sentence
==being able to put the propositions in your own words==
Are you able to find examples of the propositions or find the propositions relatable? Or relevant?

Finding the Argument

Well constructed books have arguments that are easier to trace.
Some author will help the reader by summarizing
Arguments will have statements that proves it. If you find the proofs see what conclusion it leads to, if you find the conclusion see what reason you have to believe it
Find out what assumptions the author has made, either being pointed out or left out

Finding the Solutions

First Stage of Analytical Reading: Outlining the Structure Second Stage of Analytical Reading: Interpreting the Content

[!NOTE] Rule 8 FIND OUT WHAT THE AUTHOR’S SOLUTIONS ARE

The Second Stage of Analytical Reading

Come to terms with the authors by interpreting his key words
Grasp the author’s leading propositions by dealing with his most important sentences
Know the author’s arguments, by finding them in, or constructing them out of, sequences of sentences.
Determine which of these problems the author has solved, and which he has not; and as to the latter, decide which the author knew he had failed to solve

10. Criticizing a Book Fairly

A reader also has to judge a book whether he agrees with the author or not

Teachability as a Virtue

Being teachable is not being gullible and pliable but being able to judge and making up one’s mind

The Role of Rhetoric

The Importance of Suspending Judgment

[!NOTE] Rule 9 You must be able to say, with reasonable certainty, “I Understand” before you can say any one of the following things: “I agree” or “I disagree” or “I suspend judgment”

You need to finish the first two stages of analytical reading before criticizing a book
Disagreement and agreement are both criticisms
As an author you can ignore critics that cannot restate your position

The Importance of Avoiding Contentiousness

[!NOTE] Rule 10 When you disagree, do so reasonably, and not disputatiously or contentiously.

A conversation is not something to be won, but something used to find out the truth.

If one approaches a book or a conversation as something he has to win (disagree with) then he has started his quest in bad faith.

For a book, the author is defenceless. The reader will always win in his mind.

On the Resolution of Disagreements

Disagreement usually mean you have a chance of learning. Since disagreement might be a sign of lack of knowledge or ignorance.

[!NOTE] Rule 11 Respect the difference between knowledge and mere personal opinion, by giving reasons for any critical judgment you make

“Knowledge” are supported by evidence and reason, “opinions” are not.

11 Agreeing or Disagreeing with the Author

To agree or disagree you first have to understand the author.

Prejudice and Judgment

When we disagree we should
1. State any emotional reasons why we may disagree (because humans are emotional as well as rational)
2. State any assumptions we have made
3. Give the benefits of the doubt to the opposite side
The four ways a book can be criticized
1. Uninformed
  - State what knowledge is missing why it is relevant
2. Misinformed
  - Claiming something is true but in reality is the contrary
3. Illogical
4. Analysis is incomplete
  - If the author has any remaining questions left unanswered
You have to be specific and supported with reason
Uninformed and misinformed usually go hand in hand
If there is nothing uninformed, misinformed or illogical about the author’s arguments then you will have to agree. Or else you just don’t like the conclusion (emotion and prejudice)

The Third Stage of Analytical Reading

These rules are ideal, not everyone and only few people actually do these perfect ad probably only to a few books
Your job is to approximate it. A “well-read” person is someone who comes close to reading with these rules in mind

12 Aids to Reading

Not rely on outside help too much, and do as much of the reading on your own will train you to need outside help less and less
Outside helps are relevant experiences, other books, commentaries, and abstracts, reference books
Use outside help when you still can’t understand the book after following the rules of Analytical Reading

The Role of Relevant Experience

Giving concrete examples of the points the author makes

How to Read Reference Books

To use a reference book you must: 1) know what you want to know 2) know where to find it

How to Use a Dictionary

Words have more than one meaning given their context
- grammatical and meaning
Words have a history–they change through time

How to Use an Encyclopedia

Facts are “true”
Facts reflects reality
“Facts” can change, because at times not enough information are available
Facts are to some extent culturally defined - different culture decides different things to be true

Part 3: Approaches to Different Kinds of Reading Matter

Here we dive into more specific from the general rules
Asking the 4 basic questions on any type of book

13 The Two Kinds of Practical Books

A practical book only solves the problem if you apply the solution to the problem
The two kinds of practical books
1. A rulebook with principals that proves the rules are good (worth doing)
  - E.g. This book
2. A set of principals that generate rules
  - Economics, politics, and moral
For a practical book to be useful to you, the problem that the author is trying to solve should be what you are interested in solving as well

The Role of Persuasion

What are the author’s objectives?
What means of achieving them is the author proposing?
For a practical book, it is good to know the context surrounding the author, and the author himself.
The author will use emotions to persuade you. Unavoidable, but you should know that it is happening.

What Does Agreement Entail in the Case of a Practical Book?

What is the book about? → What does the author wants to do? (What doe she wants you to do?)
Rule 4: Find how what the author wants you to do
Rule 8: Find out how he proposes that you do this
Is it true:
- Does what the author propose you to do solve the problem he set out in the book?
What of it?
- If the reader agrees with the author, he then must act in accordance to what the author proposed
- If he agrees but does not, then the reader really doesn’t agree with the author

14 How to Read Imaginative Literature

It is harder to analyze beauty than truth, hence why it is harder to explain why someone enjoyed a novel

How Not to Read Imaginative Literature

Imaginative literature tries to convey an experience
Don’t try to resist the experience that the imaginative work wants to have on you
Don’t look for very specific meaning or line of arguments in an imaginative work
Don’t criticize an imaginative work by the lack of or consistency in the “truth” that it conveys.

General Rules for Reading Imaginative Literature

Structural
- What is it’s kind? (Poem? Novel? Play?)
- What is the work about? (what experience is it trying to convey?)
- What are the parts that makes up the whole?
Interpretive
- Terms becomes characters and episodes
- Propositions become the background of the world the character is living in
- Line of arguments become the unraveling plot of the story
Don’t criticize imaginative writing until you fully appreciate what the author has tried to make you experience
- We don’t agree or disagree with fiction, we like or dislike it
- Give reasons from the work on why you dislike or like it

15 Suggestions for Reading Stories, Plays, and Poems

The unity of the plot
The characters, individual plotlines
An imaginative work doesn’t necessarily have to lead to action, it is to just be enjoyed

How to Read Stories

Read narratives quickly and in one setting fully immersed (or else you will forget the plot and less immersed)
Get to know the characters; the important characters will show themselves
Get to know the episodes; which will show themselves to be important as we read and finished the story
People like fictions, maybe because we can self identify with the characters and what happens to them
- “poetic justice” in the story makes us want to live in it because we want a just world

How to Read Plays

Should be understood as it is being acted out (you can try directing it in your head)

How to Read Lyric Poetry

Hard to define poetry, but you know when you have one
Rules
- Read it once without stopping (finding the unity)
- Read it again but out loud (feel the poem)
- Figure out what is the conflict in the poem

16 How to Read History

History: narrative account of facts

The Elusiveness of Historical Facts

There are historical events that are hard to remember the details of such as in a court case
And there are disagreement about whether certain historical events are important or not (whether the civil war started and ended with certain event or if it ended at all)

Theories of History

Historians usually add in “motives” or certain bias in the way he presents history
- Why certain thing happen?
Therefore we need to look at history in more than one point of view

The Universal in History

Read more than one viewpoint of history event
Read to learn from the mistakes of the people of the past. How men have acted and what that resulted in

Questions to Ask of a Historical Book

Find out the scope of the history book, especially what it is not about
How did the author decide to divide up his book? What decision did he make in telling this story of history?

How to Read Biography and Autobiography

Definitive biography vs authorized biography
- Definitive biography, usually about a dead person so it’s complete, and mostly truthful
- Authorized biography, likely biased, about a person still alive; wanting to put themselves in a certain light
Autobiographies: harder to trust, do one really known one self? Would one be really open and honest when writing about their own life?
- Take it with a grain of salt
If you wish to learn about someone read as much biography about them as possible

How to Read About Current Events

Who is the one writing the report?
- What does the author want to prove?
- Whom does he want to convince?
- What special knowledge does he assume?
- What special language does he use?
- Does he really know what he is talking about?

A note on Digests

When reading a condensed article of news, you have to be ware of what kind of filter the author has made (what has the author cut out from the original)
The digest is only as good as the author’s reading
You still have to read the digest to understand it

17 How to Read Science and Mathematics

How to read books that are written to other field experts?

Understanding the Scientific Enterprise

When reading scientific and mathematics books: what is the problem that the author is trying to solve is the most important question to answer.

Suggestions for Reading Classical Scientific Books

The scientist tries to prove its thesis through what he found in his experiment: understanding the experiment becomes important

Facing the Problem of Mathematics

Mathematics as a new language (language learning)
Mathematics is beautiful in that it is very precise in its scope, clear and very logical

A Note on Popular Science

These works usually just contain the result of experiments and limited amount of math

18 How to Read Philosophy

Philosophy is asking good qualitative questions; mainly questions about “why?”

The Questions Philosophers Ask

Theoretical
- questions about metaphysics: of beings and becoming (change)
- epistemology: knowledge
Normative (what ought to or sought to)
- Ethics: how one ought to behave
  - questions about morals: right and wrong
  - questions about good and evil
- Politics or political philosophy
  - How an individual relates to its community

Modern Philosophy and the Great Tradition

Modern philosophy are now more about second order questions since they deem the first order questions to be unanswerable. But this has made the modern philosophy harder to read for lay-reader since they’re written for other philosophers and second order questions aren’t as interesting to the lay-reader
From Plato to 1930 they were primarily written about first order questions and more approachable for lay-readers

On Philosophical Method

The philosopher answer these questions through thinking about their experiences more than the average Joe
Sometimes the philosopher tries to answer a scientific question using the philosophical method
A scientist can also make the mistake of trying to answer a philosophical question with the scientific method

On Philosophical Styles

Philosophical Dialogue: as Plato’s Dialogues
Philosophical Treatise or Essay: Aristotle, Kant
Meeting of Objections: St. Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologica
The Systematization of Philosophy: Descartes and Spinoza; order philosophy like mathematics
The Aphoristic Style: Nietzsche Thus Spake Zarathustra, very bullet point like, not very expositional

Hints for Reading Philosophy

Finding out the question the author is trying to answer
Finding out the assumptions the author have
- Sometimes the author states it explicitly, sometime you have to find it out by reading his other works
See if the authors is consistent in their assumptions (controlling principals)

On Making Up Your Own Mind

Disagreement shows you where the true mysteries lie
You have to make up your own mind about things
Read different books authors on the same topic

A Note On Theology

Natural theology is a form of philosophy: the unmoved mover, the uncaused causer; conclusion comes from the mind
Dogmatic theology: statement of faith that is believed to be true
- it is hard for one who does not believe in the statement of faith to read work of theology
- One has to take the statement faith as true for the sake of reading the work

How to Read “Canonical” Books

there are many “canonical books”
- textbooks for students, and lawyer bar exams
- handbooks for military
- religious texts

Social science uses a lot of jargons that we think we know, but maybe we don’t know what the author actually meant
Social science is hard to read because it is harder for the author to define the terms he is using
Social science is usually a mix of science, philosophy, history, and some fiction

People usually don’t read just one social science book because they’re interested in the whole topic. So they read multiple book on the same subject.
There isn’t any definitive work on a particular subject in social science
Authors usually have to push out new books to update their ideas and the old ones become obsolete

Part 4: The Ultimate Goals of Reading

20 The Fourth Level of Reading: Syntopical Reading

Knowing what books are related, and knowing what books should be read

The Role of Inspection in Syntopical Reading

Inspectional reading helps with figuring out what books are related to the topics you want to read about, reduce the amount of book you read and help figure out what kind of subject your are interested in

The Five Steps in Syntopical Reading

Find the passages that are related to the topic you are researching
Bring the authors to terms; making a common terminologies between all the authors so they are all talking about your topic
Having a list of questions used to solve the problem you started out with and seeing how the different authors answers them
Finding out the conflicts between differing answers to your questions
Order the discussion and conflicts, and why they differ

21 Reading and the Growth of the Mind

What Good Book Can Do For Us

Good book can improve your reading skill
Good books can teach you about the world, and about life

The Pyramid of Books

For many books 99% of it do not be read analytically, they can be skimmed
Some book you read it once and you have learned all there is in the book
Some book are so above you that you can keep coming back and get more out of it
- But books of this kind is different for different people since our minds are different

The Life and Growth of the Mind

If you were to be stranded on an island, which 10 book would you choose to bring with you?

Appendix A: A Recommended Reading List

St Augustine: On the Teacher, Confessions, The City of God, Christian Doctrine
St Thomas Aquinas: Summa Theologica
Martin Luther: Three Treatises, Table-talk
John Calvin: Institute of the Christian Religion
Federalist papers, Articles of Confederation, the Constitution of the United State, the Declaration of Independence
Jane Austen: Pride and Prejudice
Karl Marx: Capital, Communist Manifesto
Herman Melville: Moby Dick
Mark Twain: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the Mysterious Stranger