When I read books, I often don't properly understand the meaning of some sentences. So, even if I open other tabs online and ask for the sentence meaning, it gives me an explanation based only on the words I provided, and not the meaning the author is trying to convey.
Is this problem only for me? How do you guys get the accurate meaning?
by Calm_Astronomer3884
4 Comments
No judgement at all here. But do you perhaps have ADHD or an Autism Spectrum Disorder? I have friends with similar issues and they are all autistic and/or ADHD
Not judging at all, genuinely asking. Are you reading in your own native language, or are you reading in a second language?
When you’re struggling with meaning, are you talking about like, symbolic meaning? Or literal, face-value meaning?
Could you maybe provide an example?
Maybe you could take some literacy classes or watch videos about the topic?
Look up meta analysis of the book or topic so you can understand.
How old are you? Are you reading on your level? How did you do in English class?
“ The house felt very heavy today. No one wanted to move or talk after what they saw”
If you google “ heavy” and you just keep getting the definition of “ weighting a lot “ but don’t know what they mean, it’s a problem with your literacy understanding.
No one can tell you what that means without the full context, you’d have to make a post like this with what’s confusing you to increase your ability to understand the context and what is implied.
Here heavy is used to express an emotional feeling. The people in the story might feel depressed, tired. Nothing is physically holding them down but based on the context that maybe something traumatic happened they feel this heavy mental cloud over them making them somber.
The more you read with understanding the more you will understand what you read.
I would try to read simpler books, ones that might explain themselves more or use simpler terms to express the ideas. Once you have a better concept of how language is used to express things you won’t feel the need to google so much.
Additionally what other comments pointed out about being neurodivergent and reading in a non native language can make this hard too.
Reading comprehension is a skill that takes time to develop. I would suggest reading young adult fiction that has more straightforward plots and using *just* a dictionary to look up unfamiliar words rather than simply searching a verbatim quote so that you can apply your own interpretation to the authors words. The more you expand your vocabulary, the more you will grow to understand literary devices such as personification, idioms, metaphors, etc., but the best way to understand is to just keep reading.