How I Take Notes

Today several of my WEM friends and I are sharing how we take notes. If you find taking notes challenging, let me encourage you to visit each of them! You will find all the links at the bottom of this post.

When I first started my journey through The Well Educated Mind reading lists, I really had no idea how to take good notes. Early on, I tried using spiral bound notebooks for WEM journals, but I could never decide what I should write down. (And then there was the whole matter of finding the journal when I needed it -- spiral notebooks and  # 2 Ticonderoga pencils tend to disappear rather quickly around my house!)

Though I now follow some of Susan Wise Bauer's good advice for note taking in WEM, I've finally developed a system that feels meaningful to me. I'm not reading through the classics to pass a test -- I'm reading to experience and grow. My process has gradually evolved into something I enjoy. I hope my examples may inspire you to take notes in a way that gives your reading more meaning!

Confessions of St. Augustine

The first few books I read from the WEM list were autobiographies. I crawled through them and did little more than underline stuff that appealed to me, though I wasn't always sure why.

I knew I should be writing short summaries when I finished each chapter, but I didn't develop that discipline right away.

Halfway through Moby-Dick, I remembered that Montaigne wrote his summaries directly in his books. This tip was perfect for me. Maybe Montaigne was a bit scatterbrained too.

The Essays of Montaigne

To help my defective and treacherous memory a little -- and it is so extremely bad that I have more than once happened to pick up again, thinking it new and unknown to me, a book which I had carefully read several years earlier and scribbled all over with notes -- I have for some time now adopted the practice of adding at the end of each book . . . the date when I finished reading it and the general judgement I drew from it, in order to show me again at least the general idea and impression I had conceived of the author when reading it.

Michel de Montaigne

Moby-Dick

Moby-Dick

I now write a short summary at the end of each chapter I read. This really helps when I'm trying to find something later or if I lose my place.

Anna Karenina 

Often my chapter summary is just one sentence.

Moby-Dick

Writing the date and time I finish a WEM novel feels like a special ceremony!

Anna Karenina

For all of the wonderful insights and amusing tid-bits I come across -- I make lists.

I dearly love to make lists!

I feel like my lists are my own special collections. I will share some of the types of lists I keep, but they change somewhat with each book I read. The themes you choose to collect may be totally different from mine. Whenever I find something that fits into a category I've made, I follow the following procedure:

1. Mark it by underlining or circling.

2. Write the name of the category in the margin near the marked portion.

3. Write the page number under the column I've made for the specified category in the back of my book.

Back cover from The Portrait of a Lady

Here are some of the catagories of lists I keep in most books now:

BIBLE: I'm always on the look out for themes to use in my Classics and the Bible posts.

SIMILES and METAPHORS: Just because they're fun.

WHAT DOES SHE/HE WANT: In the case of Isabel Archer, the protagonist in The Portrait of a Lady, this list surpassed all else.

GOOD QUOTES: If I like it and I don't know where to else to put it, it goes here. Occasionally I see a dominate theme emerge in this category and I have to start a new list.

I CAN RELATE: I don't always share these in blog posts. Sometimes they are just too personal. As far as my inward growth goes, this is usually where it's happening.

BLINK: This is my absolute favorite theme of all. In real life I constantly challenge myself to observe facial micro-expressions and body language. My husband thinks I'm gifted with this, but I think I've just practiced it for a long time. Anyway, I'm convinced that the writers of the classics could read micro-expressions and body language quite well. Nearly every WEM book I've read so far has been laden with descriptions of them. Sometimes what flashes across a character's face is even critical to the plot.

FORESHADOWING: Again, just because it's fun. If I had been keeping lists for Moby-Dick, this list might have been the longest.

TOUCHING: If it makes me cry or even puts a lump in my throat, it goes here.

I've also noticed that each book has a special something that takes over. On the first read you may not know for sure what it is until page 40 or 50, but something always rises to the surface. Here are some examples:

In Madame Bovary, it was the landscape descriptions. I had a hard time focusing on the plot because I was positively swept away by how Flaubert described the earth.

In Moby-Dick it was the foreshadowing.

In Anna Karenina it was the classic signals of conscience: blushing, flushing, reddening, and crimsoning.

In Uncle Tom's Cabin it was sermonizing.

In addition to keeping lists I also try to pin point a few key things such as: 

What is the inciting incident?

What is the climax?

What is the author's argument?


Why did the author write this book? 

What does the author want me to believe?

Am I convinced?

What does the author want me to experience?

I hope this was helpful! 

Now I'm looking forward to finding out new ways I can improve my system by learning from my fellow WEM bloggers today!*

For more ideas on taking notes visit:

Fanda 

Ruth

Jeannette, Christine, and Christina Joy

Jean

And dear readers, if you have any tips for taking notes please share them in the comments section! :)

* I've published my post early so if all the posts aren't up yet they will be soon!