I had a boss with a very average IQ but who was a competent manager. A couple of times, I flew on business trips with him, and we sat in different parts of the plane. Both times, I would get up to walk around the plane a bit and see him over in his seat going through some recent bestselling novel. Amazingly (to me), I would see him burning through his beach literature at an average rate of about 100 pages/hr, which would be about 600wpm, except that he took breaks. I'd guess that he read at about 700-750wpm. He wasn't trying to impress anyone; he was just sitting by himself reading to pass the time.
This was astonishing to me. I read a lot more than he did and had a much richer vocabulary, yet I wouldn't have been able to follow the story at even half that speed. I eventually asked him about it and reached the conclusion that we read in different ways. I'm bored by books like that and usually read things that I have to think about to understand. If I do read a book like his, I read a bit and drift off thinking about it, then read a bit more and drift off in thought.... He rips through it with so much speed and focus that he apparently "experiences" it like a movie without drifting off into analysis. The speed intensifies the experience for him; it doesn't ruin it.
I've tried to do it but without success. I seem to be trained to chew my food, not inhale it. And he used to tease me about the things I would read for fun, apparently considering them unspeakably boring and nearly indecipherable.
I think there is more diversity in the action of reading than most of us imagine.
The intensification of experience sounds familiar to me. The very average IQ, not so much. ;-)
That said, we undoubtably read different stuff. I like reading fiction that is meant to be enjoyed, and non-fiction that teaches me about various things. But when it comes to philosophy, well, I'm with Dijkstra. About the use of language: it is impossible to sharpen a pencil with a blunt axe. It is equally vain to try to do it with ten blunt axes instead.
This was astonishing to me. I read a lot more than he did and had a much richer vocabulary, yet I wouldn't have been able to follow the story at even half that speed. I eventually asked him about it and reached the conclusion that we read in different ways. I'm bored by books like that and usually read things that I have to think about to understand. If I do read a book like his, I read a bit and drift off thinking about it, then read a bit more and drift off in thought.... He rips through it with so much speed and focus that he apparently "experiences" it like a movie without drifting off into analysis. The speed intensifies the experience for him; it doesn't ruin it.
I've tried to do it but without success. I seem to be trained to chew my food, not inhale it. And he used to tease me about the things I would read for fun, apparently considering them unspeakably boring and nearly indecipherable.
I think there is more diversity in the action of reading than most of us imagine.