• Visitors can check out the Forum FAQ by clicking this link. You have to register before you can post: click the REGISTER link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. View our Forum Privacy Policy.
  • Want to receive the latest contracting news and advice straight to your inbox? Sign up to the ContractorUK newsletter here. Every sign up will also be entered into a draw to WIN £100 Amazon vouchers!

Reading without moving your lips

Collapse
X
  •  
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    Reading without moving your lips

    We might roll on the floor laughing at the notion and consider such people gibbering imbeciles in today's enlightened times, but a few hundred years ago you'd have been considered some kind of mental prodigy if you could read silently, let alone without tongue and lip movement, and would probably have ended up in the circus, nuthouse or burnt. An expert was someone who only moved his lips - a useful person to have around if you ever had to sneak up on an enemy in silence whilst following written directions. Libraries must have been deafening and annoying places to study though.


    Ambrose was an extraordinary reader. "When he read," said Augustine, "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."
    Silent Readers_Ch2 from History of Reading

    #2
    Originally posted by zeitghost
    GreatFunTryingToReadStuffWithoutSpaces.
    scunthorpe
    Knock first as I might be balancing my chakras.

    Comment


      #3
      Many years ago I had to go and see a chap who was also the University Orator, whose job was to write the official Latin speeches. At the appointed time I arrived at his door and heard talking going on, so assumed he was already in a meeting or on the phone. After a few minutes I got bored and went in anyway and he was indeed reading one of his Latin speeches aloud to himself.

      Comment


        #4
        Have you been watching re-runs of QI on Dave??

        Cos I am sure this was on t'other night!

        Comment


          #5
          Originally posted by Drewster View Post
          Have you been watching re-runs of QI on Dave??

          Cos I am sure this was on t'other night!
          Yep! And something made me look it up today. The evidence does seem a bit flimsy though.

          No doubt in future episodes, it will be a myth.

          Comment


            #6
            Originally posted by TimberWolf View Post
            Yep! And something made me look it up today. The evidence does seem a bit flimsy though.

            No doubt in future episodes, it will be a myth.
            Alan Davis: I know! I know! - Reading without moving your lips!!!
            <Alarm! Alarm! Alarm! Alarm! Alarm!>
            Steven Fry: Oh Alan... No No No No What were you thinking? Tut Tut!
            AD: But I saw it on the Telly
            SF: Yeeessss Alan... I believe it was a program called QI!!!

            Comment

            Working...
            X