Synopses & Reviews
A beautiful, celebratory tribute to the powers of one of our most undervalued skills — an ideal gift for the avid reader.
"What you are doing right now is, cosmically speaking, against the odds."
As young children, we are taught to read, but soon go on to forget just how miraculous a process it is, this turning of scratches and dots into understanding, unease and inspiration. Perhaps we need to stop and remember, stop and learn again how to read better.
Damon Young shows us how to do exactly this, walking alongside some of the greatest readers who light a path for us — Borges, Plato, Woolf. Young reads passionately, selectively, surprisingly — from superhero noir to speculative realism, from Heidegger to Heinlein — and shows his reader how cultivating their inner critic can expand their own lives as well as the lives of those on the pages of the books they love.
Review
"Young offers a useful, erudite, and often arresting survey of philosophical thought featuring both renowned figures in the discipline (Plato, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, Heidegger, Schopenhauer) and those less well known, as well as penetrating takes on novelists Virginia Woolf, Jorge Luis Borges, Henry James, and others....While Young's latest may be the essence of bookish preoccupation, it is a worthy challenge to read bravely, to regard deeply, and to weigh ideas with discernment and generosity." Kirkus
Review
"Damon Young’s The Art of Reading is a brilliant, wide-ranging exploration of the nature and value of reading, a serious philosopher’s serious game with literature. Witty and graceful it does what it sets out to do, to turn black text into an illuminated theatre of mind, heart and consciousness as it passes through the teasing virtues and vices of its main headings. By taking a few key texts and introducing them to each other Young expands into the vast universe of his and our remembered and potential reading." George Szirtes
Review
"[S]ometimes even I find myself in a bit of a slump and forget how wonderful it is that type on a page can conjure up vivid worlds. In The Art of Reading, Young shows us how to cultivate our inner critic and read better, while celebrating reading and readers." Sarah Shaffi, STYLIST
About the Author
Damon Young is a prizewinning philosopher and writer. He is the author of seven books, including How to Think About Exercise, Philosophy in the Garden, and Distraction. His works are published internationally in English and translation, and he has also written poetry and short fiction. Young is an Honorary Fellow at the University of Melbourne.
Damon Young on PowellsBooks.Blog
I begin with the hunger of Albert Camus. The philosopher, novelist, and playwright was born in French Algeria, living for much of his childhood in a home without electricity or running water. No oven — just an alcohol stove. No toilets — just holes in the masonry. And no father: his dad, Lucien, was killed by shrapnel when Camus was a baby...
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