There’s nothing passive about reading

Reading is not a one-way process. It’s far more active than a writer imparting and a reader receiving.

The way to get the most from any reading experience is to accept that readers bring as much to the book as writers do.

As readers, we bring a complete psychological engagement to the task. That’s why movies of books we’ve read are never satisfying. Someone else has filled in the holes – and not as satisfyingly as we did.

Reading is construction work. The writer provides sketchy, incomplete blueprints so that each reader can build a different world. 
Writer Alberto Manguel calls it the"intelligent and inspired reconstruction … using reason and imagination … to translate it on to a different canvas, extending the horizon of its apparent meaning beyond … the declared intentions of the author”.

In one of our recent writing courses, a participant wrote: “Cooking a roast chicken resulted in an argument because as usual I was busy doing other stuff rather than ‘putting enough effort’ into making lunch into something special.”

I think (as we mentioned at the time) her input could have been more powerful had she played out the argument in a scene, which allowed readers to experience it for themselves – rather than being told about it.

But in terms of how much we, as readers, bring to a piece of writing, I found the response of other participants fascinating.

During the discussion, it became clear that some were convinced she had described a fight with a husband, while others thought it had been with her grown children.

But so convinced were they, some actually believed she had specified who the argument had been with.
• We run face-to-face and correspondence writing courses - see www.allaboutwritingcourses.com for range and dates