please empty your brain below
Interesting. Have you ever compared with someone that reads conventionally how much of the textual information you've missed by skimming..? When you read for pleasure or relaxation on holiday - do you slow down and read the whole text..?

Frank F | 13.08.14 - 7:36 a.m. | #

I'm aware I do that too, and I am also aware that I am missing a lot of subtlety. But quite often I am just too impatient to do the word-by-word, line-by-line thing, even when I know I should.

EskimoPie | 13.08.14 - 7:53 a.m. | #

I always seemed to read about twice as fast as anyone else but I could only write at about half the same speed. I found most exams very difficult because I had to try to put across what I knew in about half the number of pages everyone else could write. I can type quickly and wonder how my life might have turned out differently it I could have typed my essays and examination answers.

Once when giving blood I was asked read a form and then got a lecture from the nurse that I should take this seriously and read it properly. I decided it just wasn't worth the effort of attempting to explain that I had read it properly and I had absorbed what was written so I just stared at the text for a little while to convince her I was reading it.

Pedantic of Purley | 13.08.14 - 8:42 a.m. | #

I scan too, and hate it when I can't. When I studied philosophy at university, I found I could scan a whole page of Kant (for example) and be none the wiser about what it actually said. I then had to go back and laboriously read every word. So I switched to English so I could scan again.

Conversely, I write very slowly (it took me ages to decide which hand to write with). This means my writing style is quite terse - I had to develop this style to get all of an essay written in school exams. This has been useful in later life.

Like you, I much prefer print media to electronic for news. With electronic media, you can easily find what you're looking for. With print, you find things you weren't looking for but are interesting anyway. That's much better...

Baldassaro | 13.08.14 - 8:53 a.m. | #

I scan as well - and was positively encouraged to at school.

It sometimes has its downsides, as it definitely affects what I enjoy reading - anything plot-driven works very well, whereas things that rely on dense, descriptive language I find scanning works much less well, I'll frequently have to go back and re-read sentences again. And really heavy academic stuff is impossible to scan, and I find line-by-line reading impossibly slow and tedious.

Definitely agree on the newspaper front - which is why I still buy a broadsheet daily, as you're right, I can't just take in news the same way from a webpage.

Geoff | 13.08.14 - 9:09 a.m. | #

@pedantic, I've often had that problem. When I was supervising junior clerical staff, I'd be shown something to be checked, comment and she'd say "no, you must read it" and refuse to believe that I already had read and understood the whole thing.
My then boyfriend once said, as I was reading my book, "you're not really interested in that, are you?" because I was turning the pages quite fast. He took it and insisted on testing me on the content of a few pages I'd "glanced at" and was quite surprised when I knew all the details I'd read.
This is just another example of individual differences, people vary, eg I know I have a very poor memory for faces, so need to stare at people to memorise them. But I do acccept that others don't need to do this

amber | 13.08.14 - 9:37 a.m. | #

Those mobile screens will p*** you off even more when you're an old man and maybe find you're more comfortable with larger-sized print.

Great Aunt Annie | 13.08.14 - 9:43 a.m. | #

I must have been a fast reader too when I was young. I remember taking a long Arthur Ransome book out of our local library one morning and then returning it that afternoon for another one. "You can't have read all that" said the stern librarian and wouldn't let me have another book until the next day.

popartist | 13.08.14 - 9:53 a.m. | #

I remember getting something at work, years ago, about how to gain the skill of 'speed-reading.' "Let your eyes skip through the text, scanning for key words, so you can quickly pick up the gist of things, blah, blah, blah."
I tried it: didn't much like it.
The irony (the, to me, annoying irony) is that that's how I've taken to reading over recent years. I actually take it as a sign my attention span is getting shorter, and miss being able to read the "normal" way.

RogerW | 13.08.14 - 9:58 a.m. | #

I don't know whether I'm a particularly fast reader, but I do enjoy reading - IF I can find something with a decent plot and story development.

Fact reading just requires ploughing through.

Know what you mean about the media-for-phone articles DG. The few I've tried reading have been really unsatisfying as, even on a desk-top, I've had to scroll down to find any information. Mind you, the list of other articles to the side can be interesting!

Bronchitikat | Homepage | 13.08.14 - 10:48 a.m. | #

Oddly enough, small amounts of text are perfect for dyslexics....and, as you note, completely frustrating for proficient readers. Ironic really!

B | 13.08.14 - 11:28 a.m. | #

I scan too - just badly, finding I often have to go back and re-read things. And Lord of the Rings took me about 9 years to read the first time so doing it in a week must mean you're some kind of alien superbeing.

| 13.08.14 - 11:45 a.m. | #

It's really quite rude to read over people's shoulder. It's even ruder to complain that they're not presenting the pages to you at the required rate.

Simon | 13.08.14 - 11:48 a.m. | #

Wholly sympathise. I don't think I scan to such a degree, but I do read fast, and frequently, and for long periods. I just took eight books back to the library that represented a week's leisure reading, and that's on top of work. You can't beat an actual book for reading - on the move, in the bath, on the beach in the sun, in the shade. To be able to physically mark a page and return to it in an instant; no switch, no location finding.

If I spent less time reading I might write a better blog.

Sarah | Homepage | 13.08.14 - 12:36 p.m. | #

You *have* to be a fast reader on this website. It's the only way to keep up with DG's output.

Great Aunt Annie | 13.08.14 - 12:48 p.m. | #

Not many broadsheet newspapers left to choose from now in the UK. Most using tabloid format.
I prefer the printed newspaper over on-line news.

John | 13.08.14 - 1:54 p.m. | #

When it comes to novels, I enjoy being a relatively slow reader. I estimate it takes me two minutes to read the page of an average book. Non-fiction can take even longer. If there's a word, or a reference to something, with which I'm unfamiliar, I'll search for it online. I reckon I get through about 20-25 novels a year (currently about halfway through the 900-odd pages of 'The Balkan Trilogy').
I'm the kind of person who spends time poring over each item in a museum, or each piece in a gallery. Which is why I prefer to do those things alone, and not risk the impatience of a companion.
Keen to glean the full 100%, basically.

And I have never used an e-book reader.

Richard M | 13.08.14 - 6:41 p.m. | #

Yes I'm a 'scanner' too although I usually keep quiet about it because people don't really want to hear how quickly you can read. I can really see pages of text instantly (not comprehend them exactly but replay parts in my minds eye) and on many occasions can instantly know there is a misprint or typo on a page without knowing where or what it is. This is becoming less frequent with automatic proof-reading. I can also often remember where I first encountered an unusual word. Not just the source but a visual image of where on the page it was.

MattF | 13.08.14 - 6:49 p.m. | #

Being an ex hack who ended up as a chief sub, I've always been able to read fast and hopefully spot errors.

I also prefer the printed word and because of the nature of this comment, I am bound to introduce a typo or grammatical howler.

Nice rantette GD!!

Chris | 13.08.14 - 6:49 p.m. | #

I forgot to say that I've read Lord of the Rings over a 3-day bank holiday weekend without any difficulty or spending excessive time on it. I usually read more modest novels in one sitting and prefer to do it that way.

MattF | 13.08.14 - 6:56 p.m. | #

I read extremely fast as well but LOTR is among the works that I took a bit longer than usual to read. Especially the poetry which (for me at least) was impossible to skim through. Well, the first time I read the whole trilogy I believe I just completely skipped the descriptive prose where nothing actually happens.

Now the one thing that may set me apart from the majority of readers of this blog is that I can read (and am) Chinese. Whenever someone marvels at the large numbers of characters that make up the written language, I can't help thinking that reading English quickly is very similar in that one does not actually sound out an English word letter-by-letter, but just recognises the shape.

JQ | 13.08.14 - 9:36 p.m. | #

GD :)
Spotted it from 4 feet away
Sub chief? Hey, I'm Vanguard class

RogerW | 13.08.14 - 11:19 p.m. | #

As a foreigner (but arguably with English education right from nursery school), I enjoy reading your long blogs every day, 100 times more than the slogan-like tweets or Facebook status, even if I use a mobile.

And regardless of language, I find it interesting that I seem to be *always* reading faster than whoever holding a paper next to me, despite being a slow reader myself.

Patrickov | 14.08.14 - 2:44 a.m. | #

(Re JQ) Glad to see another fellow who can read Chinese around here.

Patrickov | 14.08.14 - 2:46 a.m. | #

I read this blog in 3 seconds, another good read about the lost rivers of London.

Nick | 14.08.14 - 6:45 a.m. | #

I've been a skimmer for many years. I find it interesting that other skimmers find reading pleasurable. I always thought I disliked reading books because I threw away so much of the waffle that the story would condense down to something like "Boy meets girl, boy looses girl, boy & girl get married"

Janice | 14.08.14 - 6:51 a.m. | #

Automated proof reading throws up a whole new lot of errors though. 'Phase' for 'faze' now seems almost ubiquitous, for example.

Sarah | Homepage | 14.08.14 - 10:02 a.m. | #

Newspaper writing is designed to get the essential facts in the first few paragraphs because other ones might be cut to make room for another story. Therefore you can probably get away with reading only the first paragraph in news articles.

Richard | Homepage | 14.08.14 - 10:20 a.m. | #

I don't feel that it's a my-generation thing. Plenty of people I know don't read like you and I do, and some of the kids I know do.

Are you synaesthetic, by the way? I associate colours with letters and numbers, and some schools of thought suggest that may be one way in which the brain speeds up word recognition.

misspiggy | 14.08.14 - 11:46 a.m. | #











TridentScan v2.10.0 | Privacy Policy