reading out loud – michael jarmer

Dispatches from Writer’s Camp: A Few Goodbyes, Reading with a Friend, Writing Some More, Going Home

I’m sitting in the airport in a beat up arm chair looking out over the tarmac through these gigantic windows. I’ve got three hours to kill because the ride from Mt. Holyoke dropped me off early. It’s an ugly, long flight clear across the country, from Hartford, Connecticut to Chicago and then home to Portland.Continue reading “Dispatches from Writer’s Camp: A Few Goodbyes, Reading with a Friend, Writing Some More, Going Home”

The Audio Book Experience: Musings on Being Read To and Reading Out Loud

I have never been much of an audiobook kind of guy. I like reading. I’ve always felt a kind of snobbery about the audiobook, as if somehow the actual reading of text on a page and making all of the voices and inflections and imagery happen in one’s head is a more rigorous endeavor, thatContinue reading “The Audio Book Experience: Musings on Being Read To and Reading Out Loud”

Dispatches From Writer’s Camp: Reading What’s Not On The Page

I arrived at Mt. Holyoke College last night right in the middle of dinner after a long day of traveling. I woke up at 3:30 in the morning in order to get to the Portland airport by 5 to catch a plan by 6 to arrive in Chicago to hang out for a coupleContinue reading “Dispatches From Writer’s Camp: Reading What’s Not On The Page”

#93: The Resident Eight Year Old Questions the Literary Merits of Finnegans Wake

What the hell is wrong with that book, he asks, listening to Dad attempt a reading out loud of the third paragraph of Finnegans Wake. What the hell is wrong with that book, Dad? Well, for starters, there’s a word in the paragraph in question, the third word in the first sentence, in parentheses, that’sContinue reading “#93: The Resident Eight Year Old Questions the Literary Merits of Finnegans Wake”

#92: On Reading The Wake Out Loud

I’ve written before how it’s been impossible for me to finish Moby Dick and now I’ve once again picked up another formidable tome, Finnegans Wake. This one, too, I’ve tried many times before and failed but nevertheless keep coming back to it, a glutton for punishment. But with neither Moby Dick or the Wake doContinue reading “#92: On Reading The Wake Out Loud”

#78: The American English Teacher Wonders About the Effectiveness of Reading To His Students

My students love it when I read out loud to them. Well, that might be putting it on a bit thick. Let’s say instead that they prefer that to reading independently. I read out loud well and this guarantees at the end at least some level of certainty that every kid in the room hasContinue reading “#78: The American English Teacher Wonders About the Effectiveness of Reading To His Students”