• 09 Oct, 2025 *

I have a young cousin who’s preparing for a government job exam. He asked me how many books I read a month. I said that I read at least 2-3 books a month. He said he had read only 4-5 books in the last year.

The number disappointed me at first. He claims he studies 5-6 hours daily. With that many hours, all he could read was 4-5 books in an year? But my disappointment was a knee-jerk reaction. The problem lies not in his efforts but in miscommunication. His reading and my reading are not the same.

Consider the following sentence: I am reading the book On the Origin of Species, written by Charles Darwin. What does this sentence tell and what does it hide?

It tells you about the quantity of reading: one specific book. But it tells you nothing about the quality of reading. Here are a few things that I can mean when I say I am reading a book:

Skimming

Reading sentences but actually thinking about something else

Reading and pausing where I don’t immediately grasp something

Reading non-stop, whether I understand or not

Reading and scribbling notes in the margin of the book

Re-reading the book

Reading and typing notes on their PC

Re-re-reading the book

X-ray reading (A term borrowed from Roy Peter Clark, which means observing the writing techniques of the author)

We conventionally treat the word ‘read’ as a binary switch: it’s either on or off. You’ve either read the book or you haven’t. But the reality of reading isn’t a switch; it’s a spectrum. Our experience with reading a book often falls somewhere along this spectrum:

I haven’t read this book and never even heard of it.

I haven’t read this book, but I’ve heard a lot about it.

I haven’t read this book, but it’s on top of my to-read list.

I’ve read this book, but I don’t remember anything from it.

I’ve read this book, and I can recall its gist.

I’ve read this book many times and understand it inside out.

I know of the above-mentioned reading types because I love reading non-fiction. There must be other reading types like fiction reading, reading for academic purposes, etc.

Do not think that I am being overly semantic here, as the ambiguity of “reading” has real-world consequences. Imagine a book that is important for your career advancement. You give it a casual read and mentally check it off your list. You tell yourself, “Task complete. I have the knowledge now.”

But if you recognize the reading spectrum, your internal monologue changes. It becomes: “I’ve read this book at Level 1. But to truly benefit from it, I need to get to Level 5.” This reframing turns a completed task into an ongoing process of mastery.

One replacement word for ‘reading’ that comes to my mind is ‘engaging’. Consider the following sentence: I will engage with the XYZ book today. It feels more active than reading, and it covers the reading spectrum rather than an on-off switch. I am not satisfied with ‘engaging’ as it’s still ambiguous, but it’s a step in the right direction.

George Bernard Shaw once said, “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place”.