Keaton's notes

FS Summary of How to Read a Book by Mortimer Adler

4 min read

2025-01-10 14:14

Status: child summarized

Tags: reading learning books

Reference

https://fs.blog/how-to-read-a-book/ An FS Summary

Notes:

When we read we’re “in conversation with the author” except we can slow down, repeat, and skip to wherever is relevant to us.

Adler identifies 4 types of reading with their subtext of motivation for them.

  1. Elementary reading
  • Reading to entertain
  1. Inspectional reading
  • Reading to inform
  1. Analytical reading
  • Reading to understand
  1. Synoptical reading
  • Reading to Master

Why you are reading should match how you are reading. Each type is a different level of effort and a different level of learning you will subsequently acquire. Recognize the importance of what you’re reading and match the effort and style.

1. Elementary

(needs no notes, it is simply the basic ability to read and act of doing so. Purely entertainment)

2. To Inform (Inspectional)

There are 2 ways this can look. This level is essentially a skim.

  • 🩻 Systematic Skim - This is the deliberate skim. Go through the introduction, table of contents, and index to get the key points and ideas. Understand the basic structure and pop into different sections to find some paragraphs here and there.

  • 🚜 Superficial Read - A plow through, not stopping for any notes or deep thinking. Not looking anything up. This is reading most of it, just getting through quickly and lightly.

This is often understanding the main idea and getting a basic overview of the author’s structure, arguments, and opinions.

You won’t understand the nuance but you will have the gist. For pop-psychology type books this introduction is good enough to put the book down and move on.

3. Reading to Understand (Analytical)

Francis Bacon once remarked, “Some books are meant to be tasted, others to be swallowed and some few to be chewed and digested.” This is chewing and digesting. If Inspectional reading is the best you can do quickly, this is the best you can do with time.

📏There are 4 rules we can follow as a guideline:

  1. Classify the book according to its kind and subject matter
  2. State what the whole book is about with the utmost brevity
  3. List its major parts in their order and relation, and outline these parts
  4. Define the problem or problems the author is trying to solve

While simple, these will take work. You should complete your inspectional reading to prime your mind for the information.

Reading to understand means you will integrate the ideas into your head. Do the work of digesting the material to make it your own.

Done properly, this will lead to a deep understanding of the book. However, this does not translate to an understanding of the broader subject.

If you want to master a subject, you must dive into it by reading multiple books on the subject and compare and contrast them.

This is where synoptical reading comes in.

4. Reading to Master (Synoptical)

Synoptical reading is our process for mastery of a subject. This will mainly include seeing the bigger picture of the subject, comparing and contrasting ideas, defining the issues, translating the terminology, framing questions that need answering, and synthesizing the most relevant information.

The goal is to develop a deep fluency within the subject rather than mastery over any particular book. This will be driven by me, as I need to fill in my own blind spots.

4 🔑‘s

  1. Identify relevant passages: Find the right passages in the right books

  2. Translate and Synthesize: Use my own language and develop my own schema without copying any authors. This will bridge between specific author’s concept and arguments

  3. Formulate questions: Focus on what I want to know, not just author argument. What are the relevant questions for the topic? What questions haven’t been considered?

  4. Define the issues and Analyze the Discussion: A question with multiple answers is a point of issue that needs further work. Find an informed dialogue and value from opposing perspectives.

The Demanding Reader:

Ask the right questions and seek answers. • What is this book about? • What is being said in detail, and how? • Is this book true — in whole or in part? • What of it?

Skim a lot of books. Read a few. Immediately re-read the best ones twice.

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