Imagination while reading?

[Worldwalker]

The difference, I think, is that we're reading to enjoy the story; you're reading to enjoy the text.

[goinveg]

Originally Posted by LDBoblo

Assisted daydreaming for people with creative handicaps.

[Ea]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

The difference, I think, is that we're reading to enjoy the story; you're reading to enjoy the text.

No, you misunderstand it me - I get both the story and the text

[GreenMonkey]

Originally Posted by banjobama

I sometimes see a movie in my head, but not all the time. Like other people said, I "absorb" the story as I read it more than I see every little detail played out. I read the words and get flashes in my mind. Once in a while, a scene will really saturate my mind and I'll see everything, but that is time consuming.

I consider myself an excellent reader, and it doesn't mean that I see the book, cover to cover, as I read it.

I think this is about the best way to describe it for me.

I find most people read the words. That's what they get out of it.

I simply "absorb" the book. I get the story without consciously noticing the words, pretty much. From what I gather from research, I read in paragraphs or half-pages, basically, rather than word-by-word, or in lines.

Think absorbing the story of a movie without the images. I'm not a 3 dimensional thinker. I have trouble imagining in 3D. I don't think I could visualize at the speed at which I read. It'd be like watching a movie in super fast forward - I read a couple of pages a minute.

I'm not reading the words at a conscious level,and I just "fall into" the book. Any book that I can't fall into...I kind of bounce of it. Old English, reading plays, poetry, etc gives me trouble for that reason...I kind of bounce off of it.

So as far as being "in" the story, rather than reading the words: yes. Not reading the words.

As far as actually visualizing it, like watching a TV picture? No. Half the time I'd likely have trouble telling you what certain characters looked like, beyond a basic piece or two of info.

[beppe]

Originally Posted by Ea

Perhaps that's why I'm becoming more and more sensitive to the quality of the prose because I actually notice the writing as well as the story. I think you guys who want to lose yourself in visualising, you're missing out. I, one the other hand, can just put a film in my DVD player

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

The difference, I think, is that we're reading to enjoy the story; you're reading to enjoy the text.

Very interesting point of discussion. It happens in music when there is a representative purpose in the author, like in Peter and the Wolf by Sergei Prokofiev where the "story" generates images that remain ingrained in he who listens. And the niceties of the purely musical are more difficult to be perceived and appreciated. I tend to stay away from descriptive music if I am looking for a musical listenning session.

In a well crafted book the author might have thought, designed and implemented, many different "planes"(*). The story might be just one of the elements of the work, and often not the most important. the wording, the "prose" is quite frequently the most appreciated. Also an artisan capable of producing high quality prose, he is more likely to wrap it around a good story, than a good story teller that has not learned yet, or does not spend the necessary time to clean up his words, to produce something worth reading.

And what is the role of surreal writers in all this? What kind of real world images are generated by these highly appreciated artists?

I often reread. With my way of reading that is flexible in the use of imagination, as I can control the focus of my concentration (like Ea just said), I often get different images, and new gratification as different planes of the book come to my attention.

(*) Example, if you just visualize the world planes you are totally mislead. Planes are objects, concepts, have metaphorical meanings, and if you just visualize them you end up against a vertical one, quite hard. (there is a nice smiley for it in the smiles' box)

[Ea]

I agree. That's why I like re-reading. The first time is to familiarise oneself with the story, get to know it, and to find out if it's the kind of book you'd like to read again. The next time(s) you can focus on - or let your attention drift to - different aspects, perhaps the story, perhaps the prose, perhaps political messages, or something else entirely.

But re-reading can also be "comfort-reading". A well-known book with well-known characters that won't give you any uncomfortable surprises.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by Ea

I agree. That's why I like re-reading. The first time is to familiarise oneself with the story, get to know it, and to find out if it's the kind of book you'd like to read again. The next time(s) you can focus on - or let your attention drift to - different aspects, perhaps the story, perhaps the prose, perhaps political messages, or something else entirely.

But re-reading can also be "comfort-reading". A well-known book with well-known characters that won't give you any uncomfortable surprises.

I often re-read, part because of that comfort-reading, but also because I focus on different parts of the story. As I'm not a person who reads every single letter in a book (I "skip" words), I often find new things the more often I read a book.

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

I often re-read, part because of that comfort-reading, but also because I focus on different parts of the story. As I'm not a person who reads every single letter in a book (I "skip" words), I often find new things the more often I read a book.

[same happens when I re-watch films]

[beppe]

Originally Posted by beppe

I often reread.

Originally Posted by Ea

I agree. That's why I like re-reading. The first time is to familiarise oneself with the story, get to know it, and to find out if it's the kind of book you'd like to read again. The next time(s) you can focus on - or let your attention drift to - different aspects, perhaps the story, perhaps the prose, perhaps political messages, or something else entirely.

But re-reading can also be "comfort-reading". A well-known book with well-known characters that won't give you any uncomfortable surprises.

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

I often re-read, part because of that comfort-reading, but also because I focus on different parts of the story. As I'm not a person who reads every single letter in a book (I "skip" words), I often find new things the more often I read a book.

Originally Posted by GeoffC

[same happens when I re-watch films]

"four souls, one thought" as the danish saying goes.

[GeoffC]

peas in a pod ....

[Rich_D]

Originally Posted by Ea

Perhaps that's why I'm becoming more and more sensitive to the quality of the prose because I actually notice the writing as well as the story. I think you guys who want to lose yourself in visualising, you're missing out. I, one the other hand, can just put a film in my DVD player

To me, they go hand in hand. A poorly written book will lose me as quickly as a book with a poor story line. An excellence in one aspect can make up for the shortcomings of another, but either prose or plot can kill a book for me. It's also one of the reasons I enjoy a well produced audobook. A favorite example I use is Will Patton reading one of James Lee Burke's Robichauex books. His reading will transport you to the bayou better than any movie could.

[theducks]

Have you ever read a book where you remember character dialog and later re-read the book and can not find the phrases the print?

(one time, I went so far as to buy an older printing, just in case the PC police had corrected the later printing I was re-reading.)

[GeoffC]

often !

[Genaro Zamora]

For me reading is just about the same as writing.
Through description, dialog, and narrative delivery helps paint the picture in
where the imagination seems to naturally take over and give you that visual image.

But for me it has to do with not only the type of words chosen for story telling,
but the grip that holds the reader. If that grip begins to losen up on something like, when the story gets too descriptive, or begins to fall back twenty years on a character's pass and gives off information that is not necessary. Then yeah, the reader will loose interest.

Ones enjoyment in a book, will be anothers boredom.

[TimMason]

There are books that lend themselves to visualization, as if they were written with Hollywood in mind. There are other books that lend themselves more to reading that concentrates upon the words. I enjoy both, although sometimes the writing of a visual book will put me off to the extent that I cannot continue reading (I have been unable to finish any book by Dan Brown, for example), and sometimes the writerly writer may seem too pleased with his own ingenuity.

There are people who cannot read. Apart from those who suffer from some condition of the brain, there are children who, when they arrive at school, have never had the opportunity to master story-construction. If you ask them, for example, to tell you a story that they have watched on television, they will give you a series of disconnected episodes; there is no "and then"... Probably these children come from homes where there is little interaction between child and adult, and where watching television is a solitary pursuit. Schools find it very difficult to know how to teach these children, and usually do not manage to do so. That is why something like 17 percent of American teenagers are functionally illiterate. They cannot read books.

p.S. I do not mean to imply that this is a problem which is unique to the USA; the researcher whose investigations I am relying on is French. Other advanced economies have similar functional illiteracy rates.