Slow Reading

New goals for literary education at tertiary level have been emphasised from the perspective of the secondary school reform in Ukraine. A literature teacher's meta objective is to educate "an implied reader" who is able to perceive and understand a literary work accurately, and who has a competency for the adequate analysis of artistic tools and means to establish the message of a literary work implied by its author. This paper aims at examining the issue of the training of an implied reader as a goal for contemporary literary education. The receptive poetics is claimed to be an essential component of the analysis of the implicit meanings in a literary work. The mechanism of the implicit meanings generation is described in the process of the reader's reception actualisation. Modelling how the reader's associations emerge also requires the application of psychological tools (namely the reverse funnel effect). The strategy of slow reading allows to deeply specify every artistic tool and significant detail, and the analysis of their functionality allows readers to understand the mechanism of the main message creation. The awareness of the importance of the above mentioned methodological approach opens up new research perspectives, with the methodology for a literary work academic analysis being one of the most urgent.

D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930) was a prolific writer who left Britain in 1919 and embarked on a 'savage pilgrimage' across the globe, refusing to own property or settle down. To celebrate Lawrence, and to try to make his work more accessible to students, I have embarked on a digital pilgrimage, whereby I produce a monthly video essay based on his letters. In 'Borrowed Time' I explore the various temporal paradoxes of this process. I read his letters in 'real' time, knowing what will happen, but experience them in the present. I hear him talking in the letters, but he cannot hear me. The video essay is a means of speaking back to him. Likewise, the production of the video essays are labour intensive which contrasts with

The effect of word predictability is well-documented in terms of local brain activation, but less is known about the functional connectivity among those regions associated with processing predictable words. Evidence from eye movement studies showed that the effect is much more pronounced in slow than in fast readers, suggesting that speed-impaired readers rely more on sentence context to compensate for their difficulties with visual word recognition. The present study aimed to investigate differences in functional connectivity of fast and slow readers within core regions associated with processing predictable words. We hypothesize a stronger synchronization between higher-order language areas, such as the left middle temporal (MTG) and inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), and the left occipito-temporal cortex (OTC) in slow readers. Our results show that slow readers exhibit more functional correlations among these connections; especially between the left IFG and OTC. We interpret our results in terms of the lexical quality hypothesis which postulates a stronger involvement of semantics on orthographic processing in (speed-)impaired readers.

Critics have long approached Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep as a poorly plotted tale that requires rescuing not only from the teller but also from the text and the author who created it, which for Pierre Bayard is the proper function of 'detective criticism.' His hermeneutics of suspicion privileges absences that justify critical intervention. For Bayard, the critic's solution to a mystery is always superior to anything a fictional detective might offer. However, in the case of The Big Sleep, critics would do better to proceed like actual detectives and attend to the evidence presented in a criminal investigation, which for Chandler is the proper definition of 'detective criticism.' His first book was meant to move readers away from the fantasy of romance, wherein the detective models the practice of criticism, toward the realism of the novel, wherein critics must adopt the methods of a detective to unravel the plot.

Social practices of using printed books in the digital age are mostly based on the symbolic power of book communication. All contemporary values attributed to the printed book are built on (traditional) social practices on the one hand, as well as triggering dynamical social practices on the other hand. The following contribution covers some examples of using printed books with the aim to generate situations of follow-up communication in various social dimensions. We still can find a common agreement in western societies about the values of the book as a medium, which obviously cannot be expressed by an e-book. These values are only some of the reasons that lead to the survival of the printed book.

The article focuses on the problem of the reception of Russian poetry translations in English-speak­ing culture. The object is Pushkin's poem "The Winter Road", translated into English in the period of 1885-2016. The subject is the particularities of conveying the content of the poem in English translations. The study materials are 12 translations of "The Winter Road". The translations were carried out both by English and Russian native speakers. The main objective of the research is to see using the close reading method, what difficulties can be encountered by translators of Russian poetry. The tasks of the study were as follows: to describe the peculiarities of conveying the poem's vocabulary, to outline the group of the key words, recognize and describe discrepancies in their trans­lation, to analyze the process of adaptation of the poem in the English-speaking culture/В статье рассматриваются переводы стихотворения А. С. Пушкина "Зим­няя дорога&q...

The article presents key moments of life and work of assoc. prof. Konstantinka Kalaydjieva, the first woman director of the St. St. Cyril and Methodius National Library (1965)(1966)(1967)(1968)(1969)(1970)(1971)(1972)(1973)(1974)(1975)(1976)(1977)(1978)(1979)(1980)(1981)(1982). It is a touching to a remarkable woman endowed with enormous creative energy and wisdom -an eminent theorist, visionary strategist and successful practitioner in the field of librarianship.

In 2008 I went to Brisbane to see Peter Brook's production of Dostoevsky's The Grand Inquisitor. A week before the trip I re-read the relevant chapter in The Brothers Karamazov and noticed the bits underlined in pencil-the traces of my earlier reading. My first encounter with the book occurred in 1974. I was a student in Moscow then and like many Muscovites often carried an extra book in my bag. One late evening, a middle-aged woman, probably a schoolteacher, sitting next to me m the coach saw me reading and said, "I see, you are reading Dostoevsky.'' But before I could say anything, she spoke to me again, "Must be hard for you, he is so very Russian." "Yes, he is," I remember saying. I had gone to Moscow in 1969 and in the five or so years had learnt to read, write and speak Russian well, at least that's what my Russians friends often told me. However, of that first reading of the book I don't remember much at all.

Compte rendu de Jane Gallop, The Deaths of the Author. Reading and Writing in Time, 2011.
Prenant acte du fait qu’il existe au moins deux morts de l’auteur — l’une physique, lorsque la personne cesse de vivre ; l’autre métaphorique, propulsée par le célèbre article de Roland Barthes qui aura marqué l’histoire de la critique en France —, Jane Gallop livre en 2011 un court essai intitulé The Deaths of the Author. Reading and Writing in Time, dont la principale proposition tient précisément dans ce pluriel. L’attrait principal du livre consiste dans cette réduction à l’étude d’un syntagme en apparence aussi simple et familier que « la mort de l’auteur », pour chercher à en déplier les multiples facettes. Jane Gallop formule très simplement l’origine de son projet, qui consiste dans la « defamiliarization of the theoretical commonplace », et son objectif : « to bring into literary theory other seemingly more anecdotal meanings of the phrase. » Ce compte rendu n’a pas d’autre objectif que de présenter les résultats de l’entreprise et d’en discuter certains postulats, qui s’ancrent dans une manière assez singulière de faire de la théorie littéraire — méthode érigée par la chercheuse au rang de credo, qu’il s’agira donc notamment d’examiner.

To cite a text is to read it. A citation asserts that I’ve read what I cited. But more importantly, the way we cite indicates the quality of our reading. To have the right to use a text, we must fully engage with it. When our disposition seeks error, we miss the truth of the text. It’s within this spirit that I engage with Jasmine Ulmer’s “Writing Slow Ontology.” At bottom, slow writing deserves slow reading.

Цветкова, Милена. Бавното четене: нов тренд в информационната култура. - In: Библиотека, 2016, XXIII, №6, с. 298-313.
ISSN 0861-847X
Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2905410
Available at CEEOL: https://www.ceeol.com/search/article-detail?id=613228

Summary:
The implementation of international standards for information culture give priority to the rapid creation of new, complex and interconnected literacy. This text investigates the apprehension for influencing the speed and acceleration of reading and critical thinking, a key building block for these standards. The author gives recommendation for implementing the practices of reading more calmly instead of distancing ourselves additionally by the types of literacy need for the modern life. Reasons are given for the necessity of stimulating a slower reading in the context of requirements of urgent education in information culture and creation of digital intelligence. The thesis is for rethinking the positive sides of speed reading and for renewal and active popularization of universal literacy for slow reading.

Key words:
information culture, media and information literacy, digital intelligence, speed-obsessed age, speed reading, slow reading, slow media, slow movement, time management

Резюме:
Внедряването на международни стандарти по информационна култура дава предимство на бързината при формиране на нова, комплексна и взаимосвързана грамотност. Този текст изследва опасенията относно въздействието на скоростта и ускорението спрямо четенето и критическото мислене, ключов конструкт в тези стандарти. Авторът дава препоръки за изпълнение на практиките на четене по-спокойно, вместо да ни дистанцират допълнително от грамотностите, необходими за динамичния ни живот. Предложена е обосновка на необходимостта от насърчаване на бавното четене в контекста на изискванията за спешно обучение по информационна култура и изграждане на дигитална интелигентност. Тезата е за критическо преосмисляне на позитивите на бързото четене и за обновяване и активно популяризиране на универсалната грамотност по бавното четене.

Note: Downloadable document is in Bulgarian.