What We See When We Read

My mother has a most unusual reading habit. She is an avid reader and is able to finish a 500 page book in a day. This is not the strange thing here. What is beyond surprising is the fact that she doesn't form ‘‘pictures'' in her head as she reads. She reads the words but doesn't feel the need to ‘‘play out'' the action using her imagination. Also, she claims that writing essays was her weakest part at school. Her function of imagining things has always been below average. No wonder she is the most pragmatic person I know. Me, on the other hand? I am the complete opposite. If I cannot form the scenes in my mind, if I find it difficult to be the ‘‘director'' of the book I read, then I know I can form no connection to the action or the characters. Even when I read non-fiction, I feel compelled to ‘‘see'' the events described in my head.

This is the premise of Peter Mendelsund extraordinary book. He attempts to explain what our mind ‘‘sees'' as we read. How do we form the faces of the characters? Which are the words that take centre-stage in our mind and drive the action forward? Why one reader says ‘‘oh, that's not the Anna Karenina I had in mind'', while another claims that ‘‘she's just how I imagined her to be?'' All these and more are included in What We See When We Read. I really enjoyed reading this book, it made me contemplate on a lot of our functions as readers, and whether our mind sometimes works independently.

Don't let the number of pages dissuade you. This is a book that every reader has to read.