Words from the Wise and Otherwise, Part Eight
Dear Reader,
It seems worthwhile to have a fall romp through some crisply worded quotations. We’ll return to regularly scheduled programming later this week. But I’m writing in front of a fire, and my other piece didn’t quite catch my mood.
We’re headed to the end of the nineteenth century today, so I hope you’ll be able to adjust yourselves to some period language and punctuation. I don’t think you’ll find the actual phrasing tricky, however.
Starting us off is a work impressive titled Books and Culture:
To feel freshly and deeply is not only a characteristic of the artist, but also of the reader; the first finds delight in creation, the second finds delight in discovery: between them they divide one of the greatest joys known to men.
Hamilton Wright Mabie. Books and Culture. 1896.
Isn’t that a keen insight into those occasions of true enjoyment of reading? I must admit that it does sadden me when I hear of students who’ve never experienced this joy. And I don’t think it’s typically their fault. I’ve known adults who’ve never experienced it, and teens who’ve found themselves experiencing it for the first time. I’m frankly shocked those teens read so long without experiencing satisfaction before.
I should note that “delight in discovery” isn’t a frequent occasion even among habitual readers. (And perhaps even less so in academic and other professional readers, like lawyers.) It occurs just frequently enough, however, to keep regular readers in the habit. Indeed, the next quote discusses just that frequency, and also the depth, of that discovery:
The degree of interest with which different kinds of knowledge are received, varies greatly. Indeed, it is possible to acquire knowledge in such a manner as to produce dislike and disgust. A proper interest in a subject leads to a quiet, steady absorption of the mind with it, but does not imply an impetuous, passionate, and one-sided devotion to one thing. Interest keeps the mind active and alert without undue excitement or partiality.
Charles A. McMurry. The Elements of General Method. 1893.
I also appreciate that quote because it reminds me of that oft-mentioned essay, “Pay Attention!”
The next quote is from the same year, but isn’t quite so descriptive. It is rather forcibly prescriptive in its dictates:
The study of literature, that it may be fruitful, that it may not result in a mere gathering of names and dates and phrases, must be a study of ideas and not of words, of periods rather than of men, or only of such men as are great enough or individual enough to reflect as much light upon their age as they in turn receive from it.
James Russell Lowell. “The Five Indispensable Authors.” 1893.
Well then. I’ll let you ponder his advice.
Sometimes authors tell us precisely who their intended audience is and how they expect that audience to read them. While readers don’t necessarily have to follow an author’s every directive, it is often worthwhile, at least, to observe how authors prep their audience. What follows is an example of just that:
This book is intended for calm readers,—for men who have not yet been drawn into the mad headlong rush of our hurry-skurrying age, and who do not experience any idolatrous delight in throwing themselves beneath its chariot-wheels. It is for men, therefore, who are not accustomed to estimate the value of everything according to the amount of time it either saves or wastes. In short, it is for the few. These, we believe, "still have time."
Friedrich Nietzche. On the Future of Our Educational Institutions. 1872.
The most interesting thing about this quote—absent reading the rest of the work—is its description of 1872 as a “hurry-skurrying age”. Perhaps each successive generation has sped up, or perhaps each generation imagines prior generations as slower paced. I think the truth is nearer the former, but there might be a bit of truth to the latter as well.
And with that, I must hurry off.
Happy reading to you,
Kreigh
P.S. This quote doesn’t technically apply to reading comprehension in the narrow sense (though it does if you’d like to employ it as a guiding heuristic), but it’s an enjoyably biting phrase of something often true:
Facts in themselves are clumsy and cumbrous—the cowry-currency of isolated and uninventive men; generalizations, conveying great sums of knowledge in a little space, mark the epoch of free interchange of ideas, of higher culture, and of something better than provincial scholarship.
James Russell Lowell. “The Five Indispensable Authors.” 1893.
I couldn’t help sharing.