Maryanne Wolf Quotes

What we read, how we read, and why we read change how we think.

Have read little and understood less.

The attention span of children may be one of the main reasons why an immersion in on-screen reading is so engaging, and it may also be why digital reading may ultimately prove antithetical to the long-in-development, reflective nature of the expert reading brain as we know it.

We are the worst of fools if we do not teach every child to become truly expert, deep readers.

Whatever we read from intense curiosity gives us the model of how we should always read. Plodding along page after page with an equal attention to each word results in attention to mere words.

…she was discovering once again that reading and writing were not the same — you couldn't just soak it up then squeeze it out again.

Besides, rereading, not reading, is what counts.

I'm a very slow reader.

Read, read, read, read and then read some more.

I would like to spare the time and effort of hack reviewers and, generally, persons who move their lips when reading.

Henry Kissinger once told me he was very concerned about the Internet's impact on people's ability to absorb information in a concentrated way, because we've become accustomed to looking up something, getting a snippet and being satisfied with that - as opposed to reading through and considering a weighty tome that goes into great depth.

I divide all readers into two classes: those who read to remember and those who read to forget.

I do think digital media encourages speed-reading, which can be fine if one is simply seeking information. But a serious novel or work of history or volume of poetry is an experience one should savor, take time over.

I'm not well-read, but when I read, I read well.

Labeling is not the best way to get young people to deeply engage in reading.

Reading is No. 1 - I have to read, or I can't write.

Focused reading is so important, and I'm just as guilty as everyone. I have to force myself to slow down, often printing things out or using print as a medium for things that are most important or for things whose beauty would be lost if I use other modes of reading.

I want children to learn to develop deep reading skills in the beginning in print. I believe the physicality of print is much better in the beginning for children, and then help them learn how to use their deep reading skills on digital medium.

I like to read and understand.

I am a very slow reader. I have to have things written in a pithy way.

The questions that our society must ask revolve around whether the time-consuming demands of the deep-reading processes will be lost in a culture whose principal mediums advantage speed, multitasking, and processing the next and the next piece of information.

The second suggestion is to think as well as to read. I know people who read and read, and for all the good it does them they might just as well cut bread-and-butter. They take to reading as better men take to drink. They fly through the shires of literature on a motor-car, their sole object being motion. They will tell you how many books they have read in a year. Unless you give at least 45 minutes to careful, fatiguing reflection (it is an awful bore at first) upon what you are reading, your 90 minutes of a night are chiefly wasted.

a good reader makes a good book

Here's the problem: we are living in a time when the act of reading is changing. The nature of a reader's attention is changing. The capacity for deep literary engagement is changing.

For heaven's sake, don't write writing. Write reading!