Have you ever considered learning to speed read?

[HarryT]

Augustine recounts how, in 384 AD, he visited a man called Ambrose, who was bishop of Milan. Augustine found him reading silently in his room.

"When he read," said Augustine, "his eyes scanned the page and his heart sought out the meaning, but his voice was silent and his tongue was still."

Clearly this was a highly unusual practice for Augustine to mention it like that.

[BookCat]

Originally Posted by rkomar

It's interesting how many kinds of speed reading there are. Besides removing subvocalization and skimming, I've heard of a technique for seeing and processing whole lines of text at once rather than scanning the words from one side to the other.

The new term for reading groups of words, rather than one word at a time is called 'chunking'. People who develop a wide peripheral vision can read in just two eye fixations (two chunks) per average printed line, or one for a newspaper column. Most people require about three fixations. The point is to read phrases rather than individual words, fix your eye at just three points on the printed line, and don't let your eyes wander backwards - keep going forwards.

The only example I could find of this isn't that good because it just flashes a phrase at at time (and I noticed a typo), rather than highlighting the phrases across a printed line (which is how you need to train your eye to move).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLAhtaYWhBk

You might want to mute the sound on the video, the music is horrid!

[tompe]

Originally Posted by HarryT

That's precisely why newspapers are printed in narrow columns. They can be read more quickly that way.

No. Or give a source.

The reason is that 40-60 letters are optimal with respect to finding the next line and maximizing the text on the page. It has nothing to do with the number of fixation points.

Sent from my ONE A2003 using Tapatalk

[Barty]

I speed read through this thread. It was all a blur.

[GtrsRGr8]

Not only did I consider it; I took a class in it in high school. Great experience. I think that it has helped me, and I probably should do it again.

[ebusinesstutor]

I do speed read and have every since I was a child. I never took a course, I just seem to do it naturally.

When I look at how I do it, I believe I skim but I slow down during sections that actually move the story forward. I think I just skim over the long, descriptive passages where they take 3-4 paragraphs to describe a forest or dwell on a hard journey forever. (I fast forward through all the car chases in movies too)

It does let me read more books, but overall I am not sure it is beneficial. I do miss detail on my first read. Luckily this means I often enjoy rereading my favourite books as I pick up on more details when I read it a second time.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by CatherineStewart

I know most of us have a list/collection of books longer than we could ever manage to read. Sometimes I wish I could read faster so I could read more of them!

Who doesn't...

I read at a slightly "above average" speed. Nothing spectacular. And I only get a chance to read about 10 hours a week.

About the same here. I'm now reading "The High Druid's Blade" in the "Defenders of Shannara" series, so after I've read these series, I've read everything in the series ever written in the Shannara universe. The book has 305 pages in hardcover, and my Kindle says I'll have 6.7 hours to go. I'm at page 97 of 311 (custom counting), so I'll need about 9.72 hours to read this book.

It comes down to reading +/- 30 pages an hour, in a leisurely pace, and I'd be able to read this book in exactly one week. (2 hours of public transport per day, 5 days a week.)

Thus, I can read, at most, 52 books like this in one year.

I'd like to be able to read much more, but I don't have the time.

So I've considered possibly teaching myself to speed read.

Have you done it? Are you a speed reader? Do you get the same enjoyment out of it that you do when you just read at a leisurely pace?

I *can* actually speed read if I want to, reading about three times as fast as I normally do. Because of my eyesight problems it takes a huge amount of effort to keep my eyes focused to read at that pace. If I do so for extended periods of time, I'll be rewarded with a headache and eyes that feel as if someone is squeezing them flat.

So I only speed read if I *have* to finish something quickly for some reason.

[Jozawun]

“I took a speed-reading course and read War and Peace in twenty minutes. It involves Russia.”

― Woody Allen

[DuckieTigger]

I believe that reaching the finish line faster is only good for bragging rights and statistics when it comes to reading for enjoyment. It comes up every now and then here on MR. It reminds me, hey, right, I would like to read faster as well. After a while I also remember after a short research or refresher why speedreading is not an option to read faster for me personaly. Skimming always removes details no matter how subtle, calling it anything else does not change the outcome.

IMHO, if there is need to skip or speed through boring passages in a book then the quality of the book wasn't that great to begin with.

[Apache]

For me, speed reading would be like trying to speed watch a movie.
Apache

[ebusinesstutor]

Originally Posted by Apache

For me, speed reading would be like trying to speed watch a movie.
Apache

I do fast forward through the car chase and some other scenes so I do a bit of this.

[Apache]

Originally Posted by ebusinesstutor

I do fast forward through the car chase and some other scenes so I do a bit of this.

But, would you do this for the whole movie?

I admit that I will skim small sections of some books. Sex scenes and some of David Weber's info dumps come to mind.
Apache

[4691mls]

My DVR allows me to watch recorded TV shows at a slightly speeded-up rate. This doesn't work if the characters talk really fast, but often I can watch a whole show in a lot less time. I also fast-forward past chase scenes, fights, and poker games.

When reading, I tend to skim long descriptive passages. When reading a murder mystery, I will skip over any detailed description of the actual killing or of the body.

Also, if the murder mystery has chapters told from the point of view of a psychopathic serial killer, I usually skip those altogether and just read the chapters about the investigators. The first couple of times I read a book that had the deranged killer's point of view I found them interesting, but after a while they all started to seem the same.

[Book Illustrator]

Depending on the content and the concentration levels I'm at, I listen to Kindle text-to-audio at 4X speed while I am reading. The test and the audio reinforce each other. I also listen to text-to-voice on my regular computer with a program called HAL at the maximum level, which may be faster than 4X.

[kacir]

Originally Posted by CatherineStewart

So this makes me realize I'm totally clueless about the reason for speed reading. I thought you would still read every word and retain every detail but just be able to do it faster

You can still increase your reading speed without skimming or glossing over non-essential parts of the text.
English is my third language and I can still read faster than an average native speaker - reading every word and retaining reasonable amount of info.

You can probably(*) increase your reading speed to over 500wpm without "speed reading".

I know a guy that was able to read a thick novel in a couple of hours for a school assignment. Drove the librarians crazy. He was still able to write essay about the book and discuss it with teachers. Nowadays he uses his skills for reading lengthy law decrees, sparsely written [software] documentation and other material needed for his work.
When reading fiction for leisure he slows down, because this break-neck speed requires high concentration and is tiring.

He claims that with a well typeset book with a serif font he can read the entire line of text with one look - the way the average readers read one average word.

(*) each of us is different. Some people are naturally quick reading, other people are dyslectics with lots of shades in between. Some people are natural runners and some of us get winded after a couple of hundred yards - even despite training three times a week.