“I took a course in speed reading, learning to read straight down the middle of the page, and I was able to go through War and Peace in 20 minutes. It’s about Russia”

—  Woody Allen

Attributed to Allen by Herb Caen in Reader's Digest, October 1967. For additional citations see this entry from Quote Investigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/12/08/speed-reading/.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I took a course in speed reading, learning to read straight down the middle of the page, and I was able to go through W…" by Woody Allen?
Woody Allen photo
Woody Allen229
American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, p… 1935

Related quotes

Woody Allen photo

“I took a speed reading course and read 'War and Peace' in twenty minutes. It involves Russia.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

Lewis Black photo

“If I wanted to be bored by 6,000 pages of unreadable dreck, I'd read War and Peace four times.”

Lewis Black (1948) American stand-up comedian, author, playwright, social critic and actor

Taxed Beyond Belief (2002)

Ludwig Wittgenstein photo

“I would really like to slow down the speed of reading with continual punctuation marks. For I would like to be read slowly.”

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) Austrian-British philosopher

As I myself read.
Source: Culture and Value (1980), p. 77e

“But what gave him the most satisfaction was going back through the pages to read about his first story appearing in the Saturday Evening Post.”

Patricia Reilly Giff (1935) American children's writer

That afternoon he'd bought Bird the largest bag of lemon drops he could find.
"He gives her candy," she had said, remembering too.
Source: Water Street (2006), Epilogue, p. 164 (closing words); reference to quote from Chapter 11

Mickey Spillane photo

“Nobody reads a mystery to get to the middle. They read it to get to the end. If it's a letdown, they won't buy anymore. The first page sells that book. The last page sells your next book.”

Mickey Spillane (1918–2006) American writer

Writers on Writing interview (1986)

Sharon M. Draper photo

“I learned to dream through reading, learned to create dreams through writing, and learned to develop dreamers through teaching. I shall always be a dreamer.”

Sharon M. Draper (1948) American children's writer

Sanjay Gupta photo

“I was a bookish kid. I spent long hours in the library reading everything I could find, histories, biographies, science fiction, fantasy, mysteries. I was curious about the world and there’s no better way to find things out than through the pages of a book. Even today if some kid asks me what’s the first step to take to become a doctor, I answer, “Read, read, read.””

Sanjay Gupta (1969) journalist, medical correspondent, neurosurgeon

Finding My Path in Life (2011)

“I meet people who tell me things like, ‘I read your book in two days’. Please don’t do that. These things take me years to write. Slow down. Everything you read, slow down. Reading is our great act of resistance in this age of speed and carelessness.”

Philip Ó Ceallaigh (1968) Irish writer

Interview by Tom Vowler (2010-13)

James Baldwin photo

“I began plotting novels at about the time I learned to read.”

James Baldwin (1924–1987) (1924-1987) writer from the United States

Autobiographical Notes (1952)
Context: I began plotting novels at about the time I learned to read. The story of my childhood is the usual bleak fantasy, and we can dismiss it with the restrained observation that I certainly would not consider living it again.

Related topics