In like manner with reading; it is an art by itself. It is natural to suppose that no one could possibly read an author's works so well as the author's self, because no one can understand them so intimately as their own creator. Yet experience proves this to be not the case; and for a reason which at first sight is not wholly apparent. It is just because they are his own that, as a rule, he cannot read them well. He may have a richly cultivated voice, clear enunciation, a varied power of modulation; he may even be able to read the works of others well, yet be a failure in reading what he himself has written. Why is this? Partly, perhaps, it is due to an unavoidable self-consciousness in reading his own works; and self-consciousness is the ruin of good reading. "Forget thyself" is a necessary condition of good reading. Partly, perhaps, it is due to over-absorption in the memory of sensations and sentiments which overpowered him when he wrote in the solitude of his chamber, but which are somewhat unnatural and overstrained for exhibition before a concourse of auditors. But probably the principal reason is that one of the greatest charms of good reading arises from the co-operation of two spirits toward one end--the spirit of the author and the spirit of the reader. The reader of another's works seeks actively to express the spirit of his author, yet unintentionally he is expressing his own spirit also. The author enters into him and he throws himself into the author; his reading, therefore, is the union, the marriage, the interpenetration and expression of two spirits--the author's and his own. However interesting, therefore, and delightful it may be to hear an author read his own works, yet is there always lacking the dash and force and suggestiveness produced when a great author is interpreted by a great reader. The author merely reproduces his original meaning in what he wrote; the reader, through the agency of his own independent personality, idealises and diversifies that meaning.
Idealisation is one of the most beautiful effects of the fine art of reading. The most ordinary poem or piece of prose, when idealised by an accomplished artist in reading, grows lovely and sweet. And one way of learning to read well ourselves is to sit at the feet of some of these great masters of reading. Until we have heard a great reader read it is next to impossible to conceive what a fine and noble art true reading is. On the other hand, we can never become good readers by merely listening to others, any more than we can become good musicians by hearing others play.