Got books? Read whole, don't skim

THE ISSUE Author promotes 'sampling' of great books WHAT WE THINK: You can't 'skim' through college

It's no secret that some students skim their readings. With heavy course loads, jobs, and a number of extracurricular activities, many college students have a lot on their plates. Skimming or skipping reading is often viewed as a last resort - a necessity rather than a responsible option - and students realize that they are cheating themselves.

French author Pierre Bayard doesn't think so.

In his recent book, How to Talk about Books You Haven't Read, Bayard vehemently defends skimming, scanning, and sampling - essentially all the tricks implemented by college students - and maintains that the act of discussing books one hasn't read is an act of creativity. Therefore, according to Bayard, we can derive just as much from not reading a book in its entirety and talking about it as we would from reading it cover to cover. But then, why do we study Dickens, Plato, Homer, Hemingway, or any other literary, classic, or philosophical theory?

For a simple reason: Through their work, these writers changed the world. Their words had relevance during their time, and they still do today. The same can be said about contemporary authors, whose artistic ambitions and revolutionary ideas cultivate the mind and force us to look at the problems and triumphs of our time from a variety of perspectives. Though skimming allows a reader to capture the main points and ideas, the masterful intricacy of the prose will get lost in the mix. This tends to blend stories together, leaving them devoid of their originality and, sometimes, their original meaning and magic - Gulliver's Travels quickly becomes a much longer "Jack and the Beanstalk."

But in the world of academia, professors have such a vast amount of material that they want to cover in any given class that they have difficulty allotting a sufficient amount of time for each assigned reading. Though there is no ultimate solution, a partial one would be for teachers to set aside a little extra time for one specific book - perhaps the ones that made them want to teach their classes in the first place.

Ultimately, however, avoiding the "Pierre Bayard approach" boils down to self-motivation. But it must be a motivation that delves deeper than a mere feeling of responsibility to get your tuition's worth; rather, vigor is needed - true academic gusto.