If you’re interested in picking up a copy, please click here. This was the Books with Friends pick for March and as I recently finished it,I will share some of my spoiler-free thoughts about it as well. I will be using Th e Gilded Wolves by Roshani Chokshi as an example. If you understand the basic meaning from the context, do not interrupt the flow of the story-just look up the word later.ĭid you like that quote from Charles Lamb at the top of the page? You can read a few of Lamb’s stories and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poems here on our site.Īnd in this reading list from 1910, there are a few candidates for practicing the skill of annotation.Today I am going to be sharing with you how I annotate/tab my books. Write down words you do not know, look them up, and write down the definition. Just just put a sticky note next to the event and add it to the list at the end of the reading period.Īs you read, keep an index card or piece of paper tucked into the back of the book, or write on the blank end pages. If you are in the flow of a story, do not feel that you must interrupt it. Timeline: List each significant event in the story in the order that it happens.This can be a lifesaver when reading novelists such as Dickens or Tolstoy, with dozens of characters over hundreds of pages. Include the page number and a brief note about the character’s role in the plot or any distinguishing characteristics. Character List: For full-length novels, use the blank pages at the front and back of the book to list each of the characters in the order in which they appear.If it does not appear, the written question will remind you to do a bit more research. Writing it down will help you recognize the answer if it later appears in the text. Questions: If you have a question about something in the text, write it in the margin or on a sticky note.Just type in the artist or composition name, and look at website results for events, image results for art, and video results for compositions. Many resources can be found through a simple Internet search. Context: If the story or poem mentions a person, a piece of art, literature, or music, or a historic event, make a note in the margin and look up the item.Use an arrow symbol or > to point to book titles or web addresses you would like to look up later.Box words or short phrases that indicate a theme or thread you are following through the story (see “homecoming” in the Homer illustration).Draw a star beside any section you would like to memorize.Draw a vertical line beside significant lines or paragraphs you would like to remember.Īnnotations from the first page of Homer’s Odyssey.There are circumstances in which highlighting can be appropriate, but just realize that this will ruin the book for anyone else (especially visual learners), and you may find that you cannot read it again without distraction. Use an index card or piece of paper if you are using a library book (not nearly as much fun). You may annotate in margins, on the inside of book covers, or on the blank pages at the front and back of your text. If you really want to use a pen, choose something like the Micron Pigma pens that are acid free, especially if your book is old or valuable. In college, I made notes with a pen, but discovered that most ballpoint inks bled through thin pages and were not acid free. Use a pencil for writing in your books, as it does not show through or distract from the story, and it can be erased if necessary. That will give you room for notes and you won’t feel quite so bad about ignoring the librarian’s disapproving gaze. If you have a choice, use a good paperback with decent margins for studying complex works. Charles Lamb, from an 1802 letter to Samuel Taylor ColeridgeĪnnotating a book helps you understand and enjoy it more deeply than if you simply read without thinking. EIL 4.3 Spenser, Gawain, and Arthurian ContextĪ book reads the better, which is our own, and has been so long known to us, that we know the topography of its blots and dog’s-ears, and can trace the dirt in it to having read it at tea with buttered muffins, or over a pipe.
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