- In dealing with a difficult book it might be tempting to pause and look up or think through things but the best way to read a difficult book is just to power through. - Pay attention to what you can understand and don't worry about stopping or pausing. - I read "Crime and Punishment" in this way and it worked really well. I actually ended up enjoying the book a lot. --- The tremendous pleasure that can come from reading Shakespeare, for instance, was spoiled for generations of high school students who were forced to go through Julius Caesar, As You Like It, or Hamlet, scene by scene, looking up all the strange words in a glossary and studying all the scholarly footnotes. As a result, they never really read a Shakespearean play. By the time they reached the end, they had forgotten the beginning and lost sight of the whole. Instead of being forced to take this pedantic approach, they should have been encouraged to read the play at one sitting and discuss what they got out of that first quick reading - Mortimer Adler and Charles Van Doren in [[How to Read a Book]]