I've recently started reading a new book by Gavin Menzies entitled The Lost Empire of Atlantis. I thought that I would take this opportunity to give a practical walk-through of some of the steps of analytical reading as described by Adler and Van Doren in How to Read a Book. The first step centers around the idea of gathering as much basic information about the book as quickly as possible without really reading anything. (I know, it sounds counter-intuitive, but it's a good first step.) Adler and Van Doren call this "Inspectional Reading", but I think it's a good first step to take in Analytical Reading too...
Step 1: Know what kind of book you're reading. For me, this new book is non-fiction in the history genre. Gavin Menzies is a retired naval officer and has written other books about naval history. This is a good time to inspect the obvious elements of the book: title, table of contents, index, dust-jacket notes. The full title of the book is: "The Lost Empire of Atlantis: History's Greatest Mystery Revealed: The astonishing true story of the rise and violent end of the Minoans, the forgotten ancient civilization that discovered America and sparked the Atlantis legend". This is a very descriptive title. The author is telling me up front that he will be linking the legend of Atlantis to the ancient Minoan civilization. He also claims that this is a "true story", and he tells us that he will claim that the Minoans discovered America. These are some bold claims for a subtitle! I don't want to type the entire dust jacket here, but it goes on to tell me that Menzies will be presenting geological, archeological, and DNA evidence.
It never hurts to know a little about your author as well, particularly on what authority he makes his claims and what others in his field think about him. The copious quotes from newspapers and book-reviewers that publishers tend to put all over the dust-jacket and the inside of a book now-a-days can give you some insight, but it is important to remember that the publisher is obviously only going to put good things in there.
The next two things you want to inspect are the table of contents and index. Browsing through the index, I notice some of the entries which occur often or have multiple sub-headings are: stars, Thera, ships, tin, pyramids, navigation, Minoans, Mycenae, languages, Lake Superior, Knossos, Homer, Ireland, India, Egypt, Crete, cotton, copper, animals, and Americas. This further supports the information I've already discovered that points to a book about a Minoan sea-faring civilization that had a vast trading empire (note all the various locations that are prominent in the index, as well as the goods which would have been traded...). The prominence of tin and copper are no surprise, as the Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age civilization, and those are the two metals that create Bronze.
Also, Menzies provides a wonderfully analytic table of contents that really breaks his book down into logical sub-sections. The 41 chapters are grouped into six sections. I don't want to type out the whole table of contents, but I will list the six sections here, and you can see how they give the reader a good idea of where the author is going: 1) Discovery: The Minoan Civilization ; 2) Exploration: Voyages to the Near East ; 3) Journeys West ; 4) Examining the Heavens ; 5) The Reaches of Empire ; 6) The Legacy.
One last preliminary note: this is also a good time to check out maps and other auxiliary items the author might have added. In the case of my book, there are extensive maps, pictures, and timelines. All of these support the conclusions about the book that I've mentioned above.
Step 1: Know what kind of book you're reading. For me, this new book is non-fiction in the history genre. Gavin Menzies is a retired naval officer and has written other books about naval history. This is a good time to inspect the obvious elements of the book: title, table of contents, index, dust-jacket notes. The full title of the book is: "The Lost Empire of Atlantis: History's Greatest Mystery Revealed: The astonishing true story of the rise and violent end of the Minoans, the forgotten ancient civilization that discovered America and sparked the Atlantis legend". This is a very descriptive title. The author is telling me up front that he will be linking the legend of Atlantis to the ancient Minoan civilization. He also claims that this is a "true story", and he tells us that he will claim that the Minoans discovered America. These are some bold claims for a subtitle! I don't want to type the entire dust jacket here, but it goes on to tell me that Menzies will be presenting geological, archeological, and DNA evidence.
It never hurts to know a little about your author as well, particularly on what authority he makes his claims and what others in his field think about him. The copious quotes from newspapers and book-reviewers that publishers tend to put all over the dust-jacket and the inside of a book now-a-days can give you some insight, but it is important to remember that the publisher is obviously only going to put good things in there.
The next two things you want to inspect are the table of contents and index. Browsing through the index, I notice some of the entries which occur often or have multiple sub-headings are: stars, Thera, ships, tin, pyramids, navigation, Minoans, Mycenae, languages, Lake Superior, Knossos, Homer, Ireland, India, Egypt, Crete, cotton, copper, animals, and Americas. This further supports the information I've already discovered that points to a book about a Minoan sea-faring civilization that had a vast trading empire (note all the various locations that are prominent in the index, as well as the goods which would have been traded...). The prominence of tin and copper are no surprise, as the Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age civilization, and those are the two metals that create Bronze.
Also, Menzies provides a wonderfully analytic table of contents that really breaks his book down into logical sub-sections. The 41 chapters are grouped into six sections. I don't want to type out the whole table of contents, but I will list the six sections here, and you can see how they give the reader a good idea of where the author is going: 1) Discovery: The Minoan Civilization ; 2) Exploration: Voyages to the Near East ; 3) Journeys West ; 4) Examining the Heavens ; 5) The Reaches of Empire ; 6) The Legacy.
One last preliminary note: this is also a good time to check out maps and other auxiliary items the author might have added. In the case of my book, there are extensive maps, pictures, and timelines. All of these support the conclusions about the book that I've mentioned above.
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