Dr. Prior Instructs us to “Read Well”
With the demands of college studies it can be overwhelming for students to have the proper knowledge on how to train their brains to read well.
Dr. Karen Swallow Prior, professor in the English department, has written a book to help students and other people learn the importance of reading. The book, On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life Through Great Books, became available Friday Aug. 31.
“To read well is not to scour books for lessons on what to think,” Prior said. “Rather to read well is to be formed in how to think.”
Dr. Prior touches on the 12 virtues to help build good human character. These characteristics she believes can help influence people in to think positively.
“Reading well is in itself an act of virtue,” Prior said. “And it is also a habit that cultivates more virtue in return.”
Prudence, being one of the 12 virtues Prior included in her book, is about having wisdom and learning about the contents within the literature. Prior also mentioned self-discipline, which makes the finer things in life more enjoyable.
According to Prior, courage is a ‘great moral strength’ to protect what we believe in.
Humility is another point that Prior states is important for becoming virtuous. By humbling ourselves we can then begin to love others in a way that God loves us.
“The attentiveness necessary for deep reading requires patience,” Prior said. “The skill of interpretation requires prudence, and the decision to set aside time to read in a world rife with so many other choices competing for our attention requires a kind of temperance.”
Although Prior mostly writes literature her first book, Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me, was written as a memoir. Prior describes this book as a personal book of hers which depicts her spirituality in her writing.
Prior said that her other challenge was her second book, Fierce Convictions: The Extraordinary Life of Hannah More, because it was a biography. Prior had to do some research before writing this book. Prior said that with her not being a historian it was difficult to write.
Dr. Prior received her undergrad degree and master’s degree at Daemen college in Buffalo New York. Since beginning her teaching career in 1999, Dr. Prior has received several awards in teaching such as the Chancellors Award in 2013 and Faculty of the year in 2010.
Prior prides herself in the comforting knowledge that she is doing something good here at Liberty. Prior knows that teaching is her calling however she does enjoy writing and to her reading and writing is everything.