I
used to wonder why ‘Reading Comprehension’ was a part of our English syllabus
(and Hindi as well). After all it was a passage and the answers to the
questions asked on it were right there. It was not until much later (around the
ninth and tenth standards) that the questions on Reading Comprehension required
us to use any form of critical thinking.
While
studying for CAT, the specter re-emerged, and was once again almost too simple
to take seriously. The only possible use of the RC might have been to gauge
reading speed. And yet, there were those who were miserable at it, in school as
well as during the MBA entrance-exam runaround.
My
first realization that perhaps Reading Comprehension was a more rare skill than
I had thought came in the second year Marketing Management class at B-school,
when a young lady said “Animal Farm
can be read on multiple levels, like, as a children’s story, with cute animals,
and at another level, it’s about…it’s a sort of…story about governments, you
know…”
I was
too nice to shake her violently, shouting, “No, you lackwit, Animal Farm is about the rise of
communist Russia, and the dangers of authoritarianism in general. If you see it
as a children’s story on any level,
you should not be allowed within ten feet of a library or bookstore,” but the
thought did cross my mind.
As I
delved into corporate life, I found that she was merely one of a large number
of people whose RC skills were lacking. The plainest language was being
misconstrued, or just ignored, and the number of crises, f*ck-ups and disasters
that could have been avoided had certain people just bothered to read what was
before them numbers in the hundreds.
Somewhere
that was at the back of my mind when Anon-i-am and
I started the ball rolling on ‘Reviews written by those who had clearly not
read the book’, where we speculated on what the geniuses who messed up at
simple Reading Comprehension passages in exams and at work would do when
presented with full-length books.
We put
it forward as a thread on Facebook, and below are compiled some of the best
responses we got (and we got a lot, so this is the result of some rather cruel
editing).
All are by me except where indicated.
1. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens is a short story about a Biblical character working in copper mines. The 'field' in the title is a typo.
2. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller is about that one cricket match where all the wickets fell to
catches and even the 11th batsman got out somehow.
All are by me except where indicated.
1. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens is a short story about a Biblical character working in copper mines. The 'field' in the title is a typo.
2. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller is about that one cricket match where all the wickets fell to
catches and even the 11th batsman got out somehow.
3. Right ho, Jeeves by PG Wodehouse brings forth an important message about hiring the right prostitute to keep alive your life-force.
4. The Stand is an interesting essay by Stephen King giving insight on how coffee tables and teapoys are manufactured. [Ravi Kumar]
5. Two on a Tower by Thomas Hardy provides excellent information on how two people can climb a tower together without falling
6. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandere Dumas tells the story of a rich fat guy who is so obsessed with his wristwatch collection that he counts the pieces every day [Ravi Kumar]
7. The Hunchback of Notre Dame is Victor Hugo’s 18th century French medical manual that details remedies for deformities of the spinal cord. [Karthik Lakshminarayan]
8. Half-Girlfriend is a gory first-person account of an Indian serial killer who sawed his victims in half, written by Chetan Bhagat. [Karthik Lakshminarayan]
9. Crime and Punishment is Book III of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s popular ‘For Dummies’ series on the Indian Penal Code, covering Sections 306 to 411. Unfortunately for IPS aspirants throughout India who revere the man, he died before he could finish the series. [Ravi Kumar]
10. Great Expectations is a harrowing tale by Charles Dickens of a 17-year old Indian student appearing for the IIT – JEE.
For entries from 11 - 20 in this series, click here
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