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
Silent Readers_Ch2 from History of Reading
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