Enjoy your tea like a fine book

I started the year with the good intention of reading more and reading more attentively. I reached for Mortimer Adler's How to Read a Book for advice.

- Aravinda Anantharaman

I started the year with the good intention of reading more and reading more attentively. I reached for Mortimer Adler's How to Read a Book for advice. First written in the 1940s and updated in the 1970s, the book was intended to nudge people to read more systematically, analytically and consistently. Weirdly enough, many of Adler's recommendations can easily apply to promoting a culture of tea. Adler himself writes in the book, "The beauty of any work of art is related to the pleasure it gives us when we know it well." It sounds snobbish but if you think about it, it's not unlike genre against literary fiction or fast food vs slow food. I may or may not follow Adler's advice on reading, but here's my very loose adaptation of it as we embark on another year of tea discovery.