There is no wrong way to read.
That's the message behind "Reader's Block: A History of Reading Differences," a fantastic new book by Matthew Rubery, a professor of modern literature at Queen Mary University of London. "Reader's Block" is a tribute to everyone who knows they are intelligent — but also knows that they struggle with the supposedly straightforward task of reading. Throughout history, people who need help learning how to read have been told that they are stupid, lazy or both, and then shamed for it. Even intellectually curious individuals who read without using their eyes (for example, consumers of audio books) are often told that what they do does not count as "real" reading.
"I've talked to a lot of parents of dyslexic children who really emphasize the point that no one wants to be perceived as stupid. They would much rather be perceived as a delinquent or a troublemaker. Anything besides that."
Yet what does it mean to "read"? As Rubery points out repeatedly, from a strictly biological standpoint the act of "reading" is agonizingly complex, especially in terms of the neurological processes involved. Even if one attempts to come up with an informal definition, that proves challenging. Is reading the act of gazing at symbols (that is, words) and processing the information contained therein? If that is true, then what about blind people who "read" using braille? If you are dyslexic and have developed personal shortcuts so you can glean necessary information from a text even though the words appear to move and swim before your eyes, does that count as "reading"?
Rubery emphatically argues that it does — and that the very way in which society conceives of reading is fundamentally flawed. As Rubery himself writes near the end of "Reader's Block," "those of you reading this section of the book last should know better than to presume that other readers will necessarily be working their way through it sequentially, too. For all I know, you might be reading my book backwards."
And according to Rubery, that is perfectly fine.
"Almost every definition will be suitable for some situations but not others," Rubery told Salon. "That's why I don't get too hung up on the definitions." He later added, "I think reading is about the brain rather than the sense that the information comes through."
In "Reader's Block," Rubery reviews the cognitive experiences of people who read differently for a number of reasons. Most of them are neurodivergent, meaning that their neurological system does not function in ways that most people consider normal. Frequently neurodivergent people are diagnosed with autism (myself included). In his book, Rubery focuses on dyslexia, hyperlexia, alexia, synesthesia, hallucinations and dementia. Drawing from personal accounts, third party observations and the countless ways in which reading differences have been preserved in our culture, Rubery observes that people who hunger for knowledge, entertainment and the other benefits of "reading" will often find ways of getting what they want even if they can't do so through the traditional approach of "eyes scrolling across the page until you've finished scanning the text."
"I think one of the things we can gain by looking at other reading styles is that neurotypical readers will suddenly reflect on aspects of reading they have not paid attention to before," Rubery reflected. "One thing I learned from talking to people over the last few years is that even most neurotypical readers, once you press them, they don't necessarily think of their own reading as being that 'normal,' and they will suddenly — once I start talking about an orthodox method of reading — reveal that they have their own quirk, for instance."
Rubery also commented on the "shame" that people who read differently are trained to feel. There is a "stigma" attached to not being a normal reader, Rubery pointed out, and it can profoundly hurt people.
"I'm expecting once the book comes out to hear from a lot of people with new unorthodox styles of reading that I haven't encountered before."
"I think there has been a change over the last decade; schools are much better at recognizing neurodiversity than they used to be," Rubery commented. "But if you talk to someone who grew up with dyslexia a couple decades ago, it will all be about that sense of that turning point. One day they're friends with everyone on the playground and then, almost overnight because of reading lessons gone wrong, suddenly they're a social outcast and they're perceived as stupid."
He added, "I've talked to a lot of parents of dyslexic children who really emphasize the point that no one wants to be perceived as stupid. They would much rather be perceived as a delinquent or a troublemaker. Anything besides that."
Children are not alone in being misjudged because they struggle to read.
"Children struggling to learn to read at school because they're dyslexic, that can be one type of shame," Rubery told Salon. "But then there's other types. Let's say an adult who struggles to read if they're put on the spot, let's say at church or somewhere. That's a very different type of shame, but it's still just based on the context of feeling somehow judged by your peers."
While many authors hope that their books will be the final word on the subject they've chosen to cover, Rubery takes the opposite approach. The subject of what it means to read is under-explored, Rubery explained, and he hopes that people who discover his book will come forward to share their insights with the world.
"I'm expecting once the book comes out to hear from a lot of people with new unorthodox styles of reading that I haven't encountered before," Rubery told Salon.
