“IMO, this is a very important book. To emphasize that point, I'll just say that when I started drafting my review, I found that that review, itself, would end up being as long as this small published essay. I'll spare you my superlative thoughts and just encourage you to read "The Lost Art of Reading" for yourself.
The only reason I didn't award 5 stars was because, ironically, the first 100 pages or so demonstrated a writing style that annoyed me even while I appreciated and approved the message Mr. Ulin was sending. The last 50 pages or so, though, showed the style to even out somewhat. The ending was simply beautiful. I'll be thinking about this topic and Mr. Ulin's thoughts on it for months to come, I'm certain.
My personal experiences with distraction and having to relearn "how to read" after being part of the computer industry for 30 years is anecdotal evidence to support his positions. Those positions, btw, are very balanced - he recognizes that society is in a transition state and thus has it ever been. This current transition may be caused by technology but what we do with it and how we use it is, as always, up to us. One of the numerous quotes I copied was "If we frame every situation in terms of right and wrong, we never have to wrestle with complexity." My own paraphrase with which Ulin may or may not agree is that we tend to bow to information overload and allow ourselves to equate that to learning because we are, at heart, lazy. Yes - we feel that if we pause for a nano second to immerse ourselves in deep thought that can result from contemplative reading, then we will automatically be left behind. Scrambling is the order of the day. Parts of our minds, though, simply waste away from disuse if we follow the scramble to the extremes. Deep reading - again, my word - is harder for me than it once was. My pace has altered. I'm having to reteach myself the "how" of reading anything of substance. My career compelled me to a "nut it out" approach to reading. That habit, the same as I can no longer run a 10K without training (again) first, has to be broken by a similar exercise in training my mind.
Deep contemplative reading allows us to mentally process all (or, at least a lot) of that information that bombards us. I believe that it is not only worth the time and effort to retrain my mind, I believe it absolutely necessary to avoid becoming a data-filled reservoir of non-critical thinking.
Sheesh - looks as if I'm about to write that long essay after all. I'll just close with a few concerns: 1) Mr. Ulin is pretty specific in his political opinions. He uses some political references to make his points about non-critical thinking and reaction vs thought. These are very good examples and I believe he uses them well. My concern is that people who don't agree with those political views will, which is exactly the point he is making with the examples, overlook what he is saying because his politics may not be acceptable. Sad. Really sad that I have that concern but, there it is. 2) He also is a little more a fan of the iPod and Apple than I am. Hey! I can overlook that to get the points he is making. (He is in factual error about a couple of things where eReader access to titles is concerned though.) 3) Ulin never makes the point that I feel is important to some degree: "what" we read is important as well as "how" we read. He never cites any distinction about WHAT is being "deeply read." I could see where it doesn't really matter when the reader is in "training", so to speak. However for the result to be, as Ulin says, "... the blurring of the boundaries that divide us, that keep us separate and apart" can depend on the content of the read. It takes some mighty fine writing for those boundaries to blur for me. As Mr. Ulin is an LA Times book critic and teaches at UC, I suspect he just takes for granted that we will read "the good stuff" deeply.
Good essay. People need to "deeply read" this!
DL”
