On Reading Well (Karen Swallow Prior)

In an earlier work (Booked), Professor Karen Swallow Prior discussed the benefits of reading "widely, voraciously, and indiscriminately."  Here, she refines the argument: "It is not enough to read widely.  One must also read well."  On Reading Well explores a handful of literary classics and "attempts to model what it means to read well by examining the insights about virtues these works offer."  She chooses

twelve of the most central virtues and grouped them according to their traditional categories-
The cardinal virtues (prudence, temperance, justice, courage)
The theological virtues (faith, hope, love)
The heavenly virtues (chastity, diligence, patience, kindness, humility)

Each virtue is explored in a different work.  For example, she looks at justice and how it's handled in Charles Dickens' classic A Tale of Two Cities.  She defines each virtue before discussing how a given classic handles it.  She's effectively teaching the reader how to read critically.

Review
I *really* liked this book. The author does an excellent job defining the value and importance of reading:

"Reading well adds to our life . . . in a way that friendship adds to our life, altering us forever."  And "reading literature, more than informing us, forms us."  How?

Literature embodies virtue, first, by offering images of virtue in action and, second, by offering the reader vicarious practice in exercising virtue, which is not the same as actual practice, of course, but is nonetheless a practice by which habits of mind, ways of thinking and perceiving, accrue.

In other words, books- even fiction- teach us how to live.  And "the desires that are cultivated by books . . . can pull us toward the good life- or toward false visions of the good life," which is why Mark Edmundson argues that "the ultimate test of a book, or of an interpretation, is the difference it would make in the conduct of life." 

Sir Philip Sidney agrees.  He "offers one of the first Christian arguments for the power of poetry, saying that it surpasses the power both of history, which teaches by example, and of philosophy, which teaches by precept . . . since history is restricted to what was and philosophy to what could be, Sidney argues, literature exceeds both by offering a picture of what should be."

For these reasons, we should "demand [books] that make demands on you."  You are what you read- so read wisely.

In addition to the discussion on reading in general, I enjoyed her asides and profound insights as she went work-by-work in examining different virtues.  Below are a few quotes I particularly enjoyed:

Literature is birthed from our fallenness: without the fall, there would be no story.

Adhering to rules is much easier than exercising wisdom

The promise of blessings is [easily] mistaken as a contract for material prosperity

Prayer isn't about changing one's circumstance but changing one's heart.

I highly recommend this book; her earlier offering is now on my reading list.

Rating: A