On the Ancient Limit of Reading Aloud

On our recent ability to read silently to ourselves:

At first, books did not have any spaces between the words, and required a lot of work to understand. They were typically read out loud, and those who could read silently to themselves, like Ambrose, the bishop of Milan, were viewed with amazement. Eventually, punctuation marks and spaces between the words eased the "cognitive burden" of reading. The "deep reader" was born. Readers trained themselves to ignore their surroundings (countering our evolution, which encourages wariness) and to focus on a text. Writers responded to this new reader. "The arguments in books became longer and clearer, as well as more complex and more challenging, as writers strived self-consciously to refine their ideas and logic," Carr explains. Private carrels were built in libraries; reference books sprang up to help the solo reader.

There's a lot of interesting information in this paragraph regarding how reading basically made us different people with an increased depth. We examine the effect of literacy on societal developments - how the writers of the Enlightenment, for example, led to man thinking of himself as deserving of the political respects and rights that we now take for granted. But, we rarely examine how reading in general -i.e. no book in particular - effected us cognitively. New ideas in books didn't just give us new ideas; even if the value of the idea was negligible, the act of reading uncorked a whole new set of cognitive skills.

But, most astounding, though perhaps least relevant, is the fact that reading silently is something people had a hard time doing. I just always assumed reading and silence went hand in hand. After all, aren't nerds the strong silent type? But apparently, it was something that takes quite a bit of cognitive work and represents a tier up on the smarts plain.

A little more more on this Bishop of Ambrose ...

In this same passage of Augustine's Confessions is a curious anecdote in which bears on the history of reading:

When [Ambrose] read, his eyes scanned the page and his heart sought out the meaning, but his voice was silent and his tongue was still. Anyone could approach him freely and guests were not commonly announced, so that often, when we came to visit him, we found him reading like this in silence, for he never read aloud.[20]

This is a celebrated passage in modern scholarly discussion. The practice of reading to oneself without vocalizing the text was less common in antiquity than it has since become. In a culture that set a high value on oratory and public performances of all kinds, in which the production of books was very labor-intensive, the majority of the population was illiterate, and where those with the leisure to enjoy literary works also had slaves to read for them, written texts were more likely to be seen as scripts for recitation than as vehicles of silent reflection.

On an unrelated note, Ambrose also chose celibacy ...

In a passage of Augustine's Confessions in which Augustine wonders why he could not share his burden with Ambrose, he makes a comment which bears on the history of celibacy:
Ambrose himself I esteemed a happy man, as the world counted happiness, because great personages held him in honor. Only his celibacy appeared to me a painful burden.

When one looks at the glorious reverse white lions mane beard glued to his face, we can only think what a waste. Its one thing to be ugly and celibate - its just a good excuse and no one is burdened. But, the world cries a little when one so bearded and beautiful chooses lo' solitary path.