Farnam Street
Mastering the best of what other people have already figured out
Marginalia—those tiny notes in the side margins of a book—is a contentious subject. Some people view this as a necessary part of the reading process. Others view it as sacrilege. This beautiful …
I wrote a response on quora recently to the question ‘how do I become a better thinker’ that generated a lot of attention and feedback so I thought I’d build on that a little and …
Harper Lee, author of the much-loved novel To Kill a Mockingbird, wrote the following letter to Oprah Winfrey, May 7, 2006 Dear Oprah, Do you remember when you learned to read, or like me, can you not …
One year I read 161 books cover-to-cover. And that doesn’t include the ones that I started to read and put down. In the process, I learned a lot about what works and what doesn’t work. …
“A book must be interesting to the particular reader at that particular time.” *** Theodore Roosevelt was perhaps the most well-read president. On a normal day, he’d read a book before breakfast …
There are three steps to effectively taking notes while reading: At the end of each chapter write a few bullet points that summarize what you’ve read and make it personal if you can — …
Neil Gaiman, who brought us one of the best commencement speeches ever, chimes in on with a lecture explaining why using our imaginations is an obligation for all citizens. The correlation between …
There is no question I’m asked more often than “how do you find the time to read so much?” or “how can I find more time to read?” Let me share with you how I find time to …
Analytical reading is the fourth part in my series on ways to improve our reading skills. The first rule of analytical reading is that you must know what kind of book you are reading. Are you reading …
In order to improve our reading, we need to learn to ask the right questions in the right order. Don’t forget, reading a book, for any reason other than entertainment, is essentially an effort …
This article is part of our series on how to read a book. The second level of reading concerns inspectional reading, a concept from The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading by Mortimer Adler. …
One of the secrets to acquiring knowledge is to read. A lot. My Hero, Charlie Munger, said it best “In my whole life, I have known no wise people (over a broad subject matter area) who didn’t …
Most people go through life not really getting any smarter. Why? They simply won’t do the work required. It’s easy to come home, sit on the couch, watch TV, and zone out until bedtime …
We’ve all been there. At the bookstore looking for a book to read. On one side of the store is the safe bet. The best-selling books that everyone else is reading. These are (generally) mediocre …
A lot of people think that reading, especially critical reading, is on the decline. The thinking goes that we spend too much time distracted on devices. And when we turn the devices off long enough to …