Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1933-01-09

The novels Of Jane Austen are pecu-
Harly suited to be read during an ILL
ness, either by the sick one, or by some
one else aloud.
as 1t used to be. It possesses Victo-
rian flavor, along with Miss Austen's
stories, perhaps, but happily the COM
pick against the persons and things OF
that great epoch Is dying out Of its
own momentum.
The world Is coming to see again
that every period has its good points.
no matter how much fun may be poked
at other angles Of 1t, and that 1t is
impossible for anything which men
once seriously liked to be utterly with
out virtue.
Reading aloud may not be a popular
diversion any longer, but 1t still pos
seSses many good features, chief among
which Is the fact that 1t tends to make
one use the ear more than the eye.
Most human beings are in danger of
becoming too eye-minded, as the phrase
has it.
1t takes more intelligence to listen
well than to see well. We do not pre-
tend to know whether this is a scien-
tifically correct statement, but at least
that Is the way 1t seems to one observer.
Nor is this statement made as sop
to the great radio audience. Most lis
teners-in, as they like to call them
selves, do not listen well.
They just listen-and how!-as the
youngsters say.
1t is one thing to listen, and quite
another to listen well, as any one will
discover who, having become accus-
toned to reading to himself, suddenly
attempts to listen to book read to
him by some one else.
The voice, no matter how we'll be-
loved, abstracts him. He misses the
feel of the covers in his hand, the IA
miliar caress of the pages, the appear
ance of the army of words, rank and
nle. page after page, regiments and
divisions of them, veritable grand
armies of thought, on their way to a
new conquest Of the human mind.
1t is an enthralling picture which a
good book presents to the aware reader,
and probably he Is never quite so aware
as when his eyes behold the type.
There is a place, however, for the
listener, eyes closed. In this kingdom
OF books, one which has been missing
him. perhaps. for many, many years.
1t is customary for betrothed couples,
or at least it used to be the custom, to
read aloud to each other The sound of
the sweet voice of the beloved, and that
sort of thing, no doubt, and in the
main.
Times change. and the individual with
them.
1t is no longer fashionable, perhaps,
to read aloud, or to be read to. but the
practice has many features to COM
mend it.
The principal one is that the mind,
as it were. Is taken out Of the eve and
put back into the mind.
The mind discovers itself anew.
The whole tendency Of modern science
has been to do away with the human
mind in actual practice, by a prior use
OF some one human mind.
Many Of the inventions on which we.
as a race, pride ourself the most, have
substituted the laws Of physics and
chemistry for the workings of the mind
Of man.
One mind worked. in inventing, then
millions Of minds are relieved Of further
thinking, In regard to some daily proc
ess or another, whatever 1t may be.
Reading Is. from one viewpoint, a
habit, like other habits.
When one reads much, he becomes
used to reading, finds certain stimuli In
the sight of the page, the type, the bind
ing and so forth.
He reads mechanically, in a sense,
with his eyes delivering the messages to
his brain. and In many instances doing
the work of the brain.
Every one has caught himself at
times, while reading, in the act of