6. Making sense of reading

Reading is an interpretative act and this is not simply the case when it comes to what we think of as more complex writing—religious scriptures, philosophical texts, legal documents, or literary works. The simplest language can need interpretation. Hermeneutics is the discipline that concerns itself with the theory and methodology of interpretation. Its history is crucial to the history of reading and brings to the fore the myriad ways in which reading has been understood across time and space. ‘Making sense of reading’ considers the relationships between rhetoric and translation with reading, and then discusses the study of literature, modern literary criticism, and the concept of rereading.

5. Forbidden reading

Censorship, book burnings, and secret reading highlight the relationship between reading and power, and hence the relationship between limiting access to reading and political control. But from the very beginning there have been dissidents who refused to give up the intellectual freedom provided by their reading in the face of despotic regimes. ‘Forbidden reading’ considers the history of book burnings undertaken by repressive political regimes, religious authorities, and maverick leaders. It also discusses the Inquisitions and indexes of banned books first led by the Roman Catholic Church, but then later by other religions. Finally, it looks at different forms of censorship, including press censorship during times of war, censorship of ‘undesirable’ content, and self-censorship.

4. Modern reading

The Industrial Revolution from the late 18th century on brought changes to reading. Printing processes developed further, in particular typesetting. The development of the steam-powered press, the rotary press, and cheaper paper-making accounted for the birth and rapid rise of the daily newspaper. ‘Modern reading’ also explains how the Industrial Revolution resulted in the expansion of towns and cities, which then became the privileged places for reading. The ever-growing audience of readers were reading newspapers and journals, sermons and manuals, but above all novels. The history of the novel is considered along with how reading affected people’s ideas, in terms of how they then wanted to live.

1. What is reading?

What do we mean by reading? To understand reading we need to appeal to a wide range of disciplines: myriad forms of history, literary and textual studies, psychology, phenomenology, and sociology. What is now widely accepted is that reading is far more than the decoding of messages that have been previously encoded. ‘What is reading?’ considers the world’s earliest readers and the earliest examples of writing. It explains how the invention of paper in 105 ce triggered the extraordinary expansion of reading throughout East Asia. It also discusses the processes of learning to read and explains how literacy allows for the assimilation of useful knowledge and the means to communicate it.

3. Reading manuscripts, reading print

For roughly a millennium, from 500 to 1500, manuscript culture was the culture of writing and reading. The medium was parchment, the readers were mostly clerics and aristocrats, the language was Latin, and reading was intimately bound up with religion. However, from the 12th century on, increasing numbers of lay people, including women, became book owners and commissioners of books. ‘Reading manuscripts, reading print’ describes how the world of reading changed dramatically with an increase in books written in the vernacular languages, but the invention of the printing press—and the increase in reading that came with it—was key to economic growth in the 15th and 16th centuries.

2. Ancient worlds

A great deal is known about reading in the ancient Greek and Roman worlds, but it is important to remember that a good deal of what we think of as Greek and Roman literature was heard and not read. The Greek and Roman Empires included readers, but it was orality that remained the prized preserves of intellectuals. Writing and reading were often seen as both socially and politically disruptive. ‘Ancient worlds’ considers how slowly, but surely, reading aloud in a group gave way to solitary, silent reading. It also explains how it was Roman society that promoted reading and writing among more than a small bureaucratic and priestly elite.

7. Pluralities

Many of us, most of us, spend a very large part of our days reading. But what we read is in myriad forms. ‘Pluralities’ suggests that there is surely an argument for ‘reading’ to become a plural with a new sense—readings. On the face of it, one of the apparently biggest changes in relation to reading is a matter of medium. Most of us spend most of our time reading electronic or digital media—on our PCs or laptops, our notebooks or smartphones. A range of new media can be considered in relation to reading. New media and new ideas for narrative, which exploit their possibilities, make new demands on readers.