What we see When we Read : : a Phenomenology ; With Illustrations

Locations
Call Number: 028.9 Me, Adult Book / Nonfiction / Philosophy / Mendelsund, Peter
On Shelf At: Downtown Library, Malletts Creek Branch, Pittsfield Branch

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	028.9 Me	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Malletts Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Nonfiction / Philosophy / Mendelsund, Peter	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Pittsfield Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Nonfiction / Philosophy / Mendelsund, Peter	4-week checkout	On Shelf

"A gorgeously unique, fully illustrated exploration into the phenomenology of reading--how we visualize images from reading works of literature, from one of our very best book jacket designers, himself a passionate reader. What do we see when we read? Did Tolstoy really describe Anna Karenina? Did Melville ever really tell us what, exactly, Ishmael looked like? The collection of fragmented images on a page--a graceful ear there, a stray curl, a hat positioned just so--and other clues and signifiers helps us to create an image of a character. But in fact our sense that we know a character intimately has little to do with our ability to concretely picture our beloved--or reviled--literary figures. In this remarkable work of nonfiction, Knopf's Associate Art Director Peter Mendelsund combines his profession, as an award-winning designer; his first career, as a classically trained pianist; and his first love, literature--he considers himself first and foremost as a reader--into what is sure to be one of the most provocative and unusual investigations into how we understand the act of reading"-- Provided by publisher.
"An illustrated exploration into the phenomenology of reading"-- Provided by publisher.

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COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Doesn't Live Up to the Title submitted by SurfGrape on June 12, 2015, 8:21am The central idea of WHAT WE SEE WHEN WE READ is that novelists don’t describe every physical feature of a hero the way they’d describe him to a police sketch artist. An author’s language is more figurative, evoking a picture through action and emotion. Therefore, is it any wonder that everyone visualizes characters differently? This “insight” is not groundbreaking, and Mendelsund never gets beyond this obvious assertion into anything noteworthy or useful.

WHAT WE SEE WHEN WE READ is heavily illustrated, but the pictures don’t add anything. They are mere gimmicks—things like movie stills or pages of text with most of the words blacked out or pages with a single word in a huge font.

The text is broken up with these heavy-handed visuals, making a murky book even murkier. WHAT WE SEE WHEN WE READ wanders all over the place, raising questions (“How do you know what Anna Karenina looks like?”) without ever giving answers. Mendelsund clearly did no research into neuroscience, psychology, or pedagogy to pinpoint what we actually see in our minds when we read.