Speed reading: how to absorb the classics without breaking a sweat

Embed from Getty Images

We all love to read. We’re also, every last one of us, crunched for time. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could get to all those classics you’ve been meaning to read — for-ever — and be able to discuss them at highbrow gatherings and coffee klatsches? Wouldn’t you like to say, wisely, with complete confidence, that the real message of The Sun Also Rises is, “It was in Europe after the war. We were depressed. We drank a lot. We were still depressed”?

Well, the good people at Book-A-Minute Classics have done the boiling down for you. I dare say you can get through more than one book a minute there, putting everything from Beowulf to Catch-22 under your belt in one brief session.

Here, for instance, is the short version of Anna Karenina. Who has time to read that tome in our busy 21st century lives?

Anna Karenina
I am having an affair with Count Vronsky.

Alexey Karenin
I can only forgive you if you die afterward.

Anna Karenina and Count Vronsky
Then the cruel double standard of upper class Russian society shall have to tear us apart.

(It does.)

THE END

All you miss is Tolstoy’s tiresome prose, as translated by Constance Garnett (usually), because you bought the 99 cent edition.

Here at What The Hell I’m all about saving you time. So you can read my books.

Advertisements