A History of Reading, pages 3-123

THE LAST PAGE
I like the images created by the author on pages 3-5 of the readers from these pictures, paintings, and statues, but I feel it is a little long-winded for him to merely say he is not alone. I feel what he means by this statement is only that he is not alone in his love of reading.
On page six, Manguel writes "we always think that we are alone in each discovery, and that every experience, from death to birth, is terrifyingly unique," and I never really thought of that. I have eureka moments every now and then, but I never thought about how vain I was in thinking those thoughts were mine first, and alone, and how everyone would be impressed in my clever thoughts.
Page 11 "I took to trailing far behind them, murmuring, 'Hear, hear.'" I find myself feeling this way with some of the things Manguel writes, but not knowing how to blog about it.
Just below the quote on page twelve, he uses the word fantastical. I did not know that was a real word! I thought it was just a commonly used made-up word. I like how he uses it to describe how he believed everything in his books was real.
READING SHADOWS
Whoa! Page 35: I would have never thought that people who were left-handed were left-handed because they used the other side of their brain to think! I wonder if those people have different thought patterns because of this.
THE SILENT READERS
Page 42: It's strange that Ambrose read silently. I thought that you could only understand written Latin when it was read aloud because it had no spaces or punctuation. Maybe he was just awesome.
Page 43: "The implication is that this method of reading, this silent perusing of the page, was in his time something out of the ordinary, and that normal reading was performed out loud." I think this is very dense of him to write this. He is writing a book on the history of reading! Shouldn't he know that you had to read Latin out loud because there weren't spaces? This irritates me.
Page 48: I am going mad with how he is slowly writing about the way people read aloud and why. He could have said it, and been done with it.
THE BOOK OF MEMORY
Page 58: The King of Egypt says that if people learn to read, "they will cease to exercise memory because they will rely on that which is written." I love that this is in here because we still say this of knew things. People say that we don't have to remember anything because we can just Google it, and if we forget, well, Google it again! "A reader, Socrates admonished Phaedrus, 'must be singularly simple-minded to believe that written words can do anything more than remind one what one already knows.'" I want to use this in a debate on Google right now!
LEARNING TO READ

THE MISSING FIRST PAGE
Page 86: Manguel personifies books, saying, "The books on my shelves do not know me until I open them, yet I am certain that they address me--me and every other reader--by name; they await our comments and opinions." I like that he mentions this, because I feel like a good book is alive, sitting on the shelf calling softly to everyone just waiting to tell its story. I never really think about the book having a plot when I start it. The book comes to life as I turn the page, and the end isn't written until I have read it.
PICTURE READING
I mostly just listened to what the book was saying in this chapter, however, it did make me think of a time I wanted to read a story before I knew how to read. I pulled out a large book full of children's stories, and opened it up to a random page in the middle. I had never tried to read a story on my own, and thought I could do it after listening to my mom read to me. I had opened up to "The Ugly Duckling," but did not know this at the time. I remember crying because I couldn't figure out what the pictures were saying, and thinking years later that there were no words, only pictures to the story.
BEING READ TO
When he talks of his lover, I automatically halt my thought pattern because that is never written about in text books! I think it should be more common. Everyone needs a little more love, and it kind of makes me want to giggle. Maybe I'm just being silly.
I don't care for being read to because it is hard to concentrate, and I never really have as good of an experience as I would if I read it myself. The only exception I can think of is hearing Shel Silverstein read his own poetry.

About Me

HEY! My name is Kim!
I'm 22 and a Junior majoring in English. When I first started at KSU I was majoring in Computer Science but soon switched to Programming which was a terrible mistake. I cannot stand Programming! I am majoring in English because I hope to write Young Adult novels. I write stories for myself that I seem to never finish. I spend most of my time reading, watching youtube videos, and trying to fix my nintendo from the 80's.

I don't really know what I'm supposed to say here, actually. I feel weird talking about myself. What am I supposed to say? I'm mostly really funny half the time, and am a really big nerd, but still made of awesome? I guess that's pretty much me. Oh, and I have a dog named Koko Mo but I call him stinky...because he's a dog...and most of the time he stinks. But he dances for treats, so we keep him around.

I'm also a big fan of Dr. Who.