Reading is Creative

We all know that writing is a creative act, but many of us overlook the fact that reading, which is such an inseparable part of writing, also involves the reader's imagination in ways that literary theorists and neurobiologists have been studying for some time.

I was reminded of the work of Norman Holland of the University of Florida and others when I encountered a blog by Nicholas Carr a few months back. He writes about how narrative literature "takes hold of the brain in curious and powerful ways."

It seems that, as we read a story, our own experiences and knowledge join with the narrative to create something like a dream of the work we read, and we inhabit that dream as if it were an actual place, Carr says.

You might be thinking, "Of course, I know that reading, like immersion in a film, is emotionally engaging and absorbing, that we lose ourselves."  But did you know that experiencing strong feelings from a fictional work can cause alterations in brain functions?  I don't know how the reactions a reader has can ever be measured in a laboratory, but the mounting evidence from various researchers about the social and psychological implications of reading is impressive.

Quoting Keith Oatley as well as Holland, Carr says that "a book is rewritten in the mind of every reader, and the book rewrites the reader's mind in a unique way, too."  An astounding statement.

Does reading literature make us more attentive to the real-life feelings of others around us? Do we become more empathetic?  Such are some of the imponderables as we consider what happens when the reader withdraws from his or her own world into a fictive world, which can be a way to connect more deeply into the inner lives of ourselves and "others"--even if these others are imagined characters.

If reading fiction can alter the reader's personality in various ways, imagine what happens cognitively to the writer, who both creates alternate worlds and, in revising his work, becomes the first reader of this work--and is changed in ways yet to be determined.

The Perils of E-mail

Once again, I am reminded of the dangers of electronic communication, or more specifically, the imperative toward speed at the expense of reflection inherent in the systems modern technology makes possible.

Speedy communication has many benefits, but it is also easy, as I learned again today, for people to fail to think about their readers and to edit what they say.

Involved were plans for a coming talk. 'M' wrote to her good friend, 'B,' with some pointed comments about ways to improve the staging of my talk on April 1. 'B' forwarded these remarks, which were hastily written with no thought they anyone else would see them but 'B,' to me.

Unfortunately, M's remarks were poorly worded and included indirect criticism of my style that I found offensive. So there was an angry exchange of e-mails to those involved, and to others in the organization, resulting in profuse apologies and hurt feelings and minor suffering that could so easily have been avoided if both M and B had taken the time to read what they had written and realized that forwarding their comments to me was inappropriate at best.

Too often, speed and the rush of events that dictate so much communication--I think of the too-rapid speech of some media and telephone spokespersons--prevents clarity and therefore upends the very purpose of communication.

There are many other problems unrelated to rushing--I recently read about Nicholas Carr's book on how the internet is affecting our brains and Evgeny Morozov's book on how Twitter, in creating false intimacy, can bring out the worst in people.

Carr, quoted by Maureen Dowd in the NYTimes last month, says that if we are to be aware of our deeper emotions and true feelings, we need to quiet down and be attentive; instead, we are endlessly interrupted and distracted.

What happens to careful thought and effective communication in such a world? My recent experience provides the answer: the new technology makes communication easier but complicates things since it is full of pitfalls and perils.

As I tell my writing students, Be careful what you say in an e-mail. There is no privacy in this still uncharted territory, and the same would apply to other, newer forms of social media.

Is there such a thing as slow,mindful electronic communication?

Reader's Block?

When I check out Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish blog, I am invariably introduced to articles I would not otherwise discover. Most recently, comments by the British writer Geoff Dyer, who, while shaped by his wide reading, has, for whatever reason, begun to suffer, not from the usual writer's block, but from an aversion to reading.

Perhaps, as he confesses, he is overdisciminating, maybe even lazy. He feels guilty, apparently, in not being motivated to read as he did twenty years earlier. He is right in saying that much fiction being published is a waste of time. Perhaps he is impatient and thus affected by the immediate gratification we all quickly learn from the media.

There are so many options out there for anyone intellectually curious, as Dyer obviously is. It is hard to concentrate on reading because, I think, we have learned from the computerized world of messaging that speed counts; the result is a scattering of our attention. Some would say that too much reliance on the web makes our thinking shallower.

Adam Gopnik, quoting Nicholas Carr in the current New Yorker, makes this
point. I suspect that Dyer has much in common with Sven Birkerts (author of "The Gutenberg Elegies"), who laments the loss of inner life that has long been made possible by the leisurely reading of fiction.

The way the social media and even the web make being unavailable a sin has clear implications for any serious reader, who needs uninterrupted time and attention, which are all too rare given the extensive competition.

Dyer no doubt would nod in agreement at the words of Rumi (the 13th cent. Sufi mystic): "I have lived too long where I can be reached."