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A review by notwellread
Remember Everything You Read by Stanley D. Frank
2.0
2.5 stars.
I give this a relatively low rating not because the tips are bad (after all, they will require much more practice before I can make that judgement), but because the title, subject, and contents are all different. The title suggests that the book is mainly about increasing comprehension, yet it is ostensibly a speed-reading book (and I read it for this reason), yet the contents are primarily about how to study for exams.
(As it happens, I also found myself disagreeing with some of the advice — not all topics are simple enough to be summarised in the mind-map-type exercises suggested, and I think in most essay-writing exams you can only really spare 5-10 minutes for planning and proofreading at the beginning and end, with the rest of the time going to writing the actual essay(s): I agree that reading the questions carefully is paramount, but this is part of the planning stage in which you decide how best to answer, rather than the execution of the exercise itself.)
Overall the target audience seems rather muddled — the book advertises itself for a general audience, yet on the inside the primary target audience seems to be students, until the author throws us oldies a bone here and there by explaining how the same techniques can be applied to general reading, though this still means that the studying and exam techniques which make up about half the book don’t apply to us. It also says at the beginning that, if you’re an adult, you can learn the techniques yourself and then ‘test your youngster’ afterwards, so a different target is suggested here once again. Given that the book emphasises that you should understand the Gestalt, the ‘main thrust’ of what you’re reading, it’s not a great sign that the main purpose is unclear.
Nevertheless, once the book finally gets on to the actual speed-reading techniques (a little less than halfway through), there’s some purportedly useful advice about how you can go over the same chapter or book in multiple ways in a relatively short space of time, allowing you to get the bigger picture and main themes while still picking up a reasonable level of detail. I’m not entirely convinced that the overview or preview stages would allow you to learn anything new, but it might make it possible to recognise concepts you’re already familiar with and get a sense of what’s important before you start on reading proper; it’s also a repackaged version of some pretty familiar, conventional advice, so there’s probably something to it, though I would personally still emphasise ‘reading’ itself over any skimming techniques no matter what I’m reading in order to get any level of detail.
The problem with prioritising the main ‘reading’ part of the process, however, is that this is one of the least explained aspects of the technique: the hand motions for linear reading (‘underlining’ each line with your finger as you go) would be too slow to constitute anything resembling ‘speed-reading’, but the other hand motions suggested (which tend to be moving or sweeping your hand close to vertically down the page) would be too fast to allow you to see every word as advised. We get lots of testimonies, but little detailed explanation of how the subjects actually read after overview and post view are done. The actual reading is the most important part of the process, but it’s not clear how you can both use the hand sweeping techniques to speed up and maintain a good level of comprehension, unless revisiting the text over and over is meant to do the whole job (which I think is what’s intended here). Perhaps this is elaborated on more in their actual course?
I still intend to try out these techniques, even if they end up being more useful for skimming rather than deeper reading (this seems likely, since the author concedes that the linear, or underlining, hand motion is better for ‘heavier’ material, so realistically you will still need to slow down to read anything particularly difficult or important. I have taken notes and instructions from the parts of the book that have value for the actual purposes of speed-reading, but the rest of the contents do not reflect what it says on the tin.
I give this a relatively low rating not because the tips are bad (after all, they will require much more practice before I can make that judgement), but because the title, subject, and contents are all different. The title suggests that the book is mainly about increasing comprehension, yet it is ostensibly a speed-reading book (and I read it for this reason), yet the contents are primarily about how to study for exams.
(As it happens, I also found myself disagreeing with some of the advice — not all topics are simple enough to be summarised in the mind-map-type exercises suggested, and I think in most essay-writing exams you can only really spare 5-10 minutes for planning and proofreading at the beginning and end, with the rest of the time going to writing the actual essay(s): I agree that reading the questions carefully is paramount, but this is part of the planning stage in which you decide how best to answer, rather than the execution of the exercise itself.)
Overall the target audience seems rather muddled — the book advertises itself for a general audience, yet on the inside the primary target audience seems to be students, until the author throws us oldies a bone here and there by explaining how the same techniques can be applied to general reading, though this still means that the studying and exam techniques which make up about half the book don’t apply to us. It also says at the beginning that, if you’re an adult, you can learn the techniques yourself and then ‘test your youngster’ afterwards, so a different target is suggested here once again. Given that the book emphasises that you should understand the Gestalt, the ‘main thrust’ of what you’re reading, it’s not a great sign that the main purpose is unclear.
Nevertheless, once the book finally gets on to the actual speed-reading techniques (a little less than halfway through), there’s some purportedly useful advice about how you can go over the same chapter or book in multiple ways in a relatively short space of time, allowing you to get the bigger picture and main themes while still picking up a reasonable level of detail. I’m not entirely convinced that the overview or preview stages would allow you to learn anything new, but it might make it possible to recognise concepts you’re already familiar with and get a sense of what’s important before you start on reading proper; it’s also a repackaged version of some pretty familiar, conventional advice, so there’s probably something to it, though I would personally still emphasise ‘reading’ itself over any skimming techniques no matter what I’m reading in order to get any level of detail.
The problem with prioritising the main ‘reading’ part of the process, however, is that this is one of the least explained aspects of the technique: the hand motions for linear reading (‘underlining’ each line with your finger as you go) would be too slow to constitute anything resembling ‘speed-reading’, but the other hand motions suggested (which tend to be moving or sweeping your hand close to vertically down the page) would be too fast to allow you to see every word as advised. We get lots of testimonies, but little detailed explanation of how the subjects actually read after overview and post view are done. The actual reading is the most important part of the process, but it’s not clear how you can both use the hand sweeping techniques to speed up and maintain a good level of comprehension, unless revisiting the text over and over is meant to do the whole job (which I think is what’s intended here). Perhaps this is elaborated on more in their actual course?
I still intend to try out these techniques, even if they end up being more useful for skimming rather than deeper reading (this seems likely, since the author concedes that the linear, or underlining, hand motion is better for ‘heavier’ material, so realistically you will still need to slow down to read anything particularly difficult or important. I have taken notes and instructions from the parts of the book that have value for the actual purposes of speed-reading, but the rest of the contents do not reflect what it says on the tin.