The Joy of Annotating Books

I’ve been a bookworm all my life. I started reading at a young age, which my mother attributes to my watching Sesame Street. 

Ernie and Bert and ABC songs aside, books were my first and best friends. I lived in books. In books I saw that there were other worlds, other times, other ways to live. I remember sitting in Mrs. McCoy’s third grade classroom, there on the blue and red checkered rug near the well-stocked bookcases. I remember Mrs. McCoy watching me as I read while the other kids played. I read Charlotte’s Web. I read everything by Beverly Cleary. I read the Little House on the Prairie books. I discovered Judy Blume.

It’s hardly a surprise that I ended up with two university degrees in English and a PhD in Education, where I studied journaling and storytelling for my dissertation. It’s also not surprising that I make my primary living as an English teacher.

What may be a surprise is that for years I thought that annotating inside books was akin to graffiti-like defacing of public property. While I’ve taught my students how to annotate for years, we always worked with copies of the text. Even when I was studying literature, I’d make copies of the text and mark those up or take notes in a journal.

About two years ago, I picked up an old copy of a paperback, one that had no emotional value to me, and I went ahead and annotated the book just to see what would happen. What happened was that I discovered the true value of annotating. Not only do I feel as if I’m actively reading, but I remember what I’ve read better.  

Marking Texts For Enjoyment

I don’t have a specific game plan for annotating books I read for enjoyment. Some books I read and don’t annotate. It’s not that I don’t like the books; it’s just that nothing jumps out at me. I recently read The Hobbit, and while I adored the story and the narrative voice, and I would very much like to eat second breakfast in my cozy hobbit-hole, there was nothing I felt I needed to expand on. 

I only annotate when I have something to say. Maybe I’m making a personal, text, or world connection. Maybe there’s something I want to remember. Maybe I like the way a sentence or phrase is written. Maybe I discovered some key information or something that connects to the theme. Maybe I make a discovery about the characters or I start to see a pattern. If it’s a mystery, maybe I’m trying to guess whodunnit. 

How I Annotate Fiction

I don’t like to stop reading to annotate when I’m reading a novel. I prefer to stay immersed in the story, so I’ll fold down the tip of the page so I can go back another time to add my thoughts. For some people, dog-earing a page is worse than writing in the book, but for me, if I’m going to mark up the pages then a little folding won’t hurt anything. 

The next day, before I pick up the book to read, I’ll grab my highlighters, my black gel pen, and my book tabs. Then I’ll go back over my dog-earred pages, highlight the points that struck me, and I’ll add my marginalia–the notes I make in the margins around the text. 

I stress to my students that highlighting, circling, or underlining by itself doesn’t mean anything. A circle is just a circle. Why are you highlighting? What struck you about that passage? What did you learn? What questions did you have? What connections did you make? Write it down. Writing is thinking on paper. By writing down your thoughts you’re forcing yourself to interact with the text and you’ll understand it better. 

For me, annotating books that I read for entertainment is a way of having a dialogue with these great stories and authors. My annotations are my journal as I read this book. Here are my thoughts. Here is what I learned. Here is how this book affected me.

I don’t like to take up all the margin space since I might have something different to say the next time I read the book, or I might want to add more to what I’ve already said. This is where handy-dandy post-it notes come in. If my thoughts require more space, I write them on post-it notes and stick the notes onto the pages. 

How I Annotate Nonfiction For Research

I annotate research differently. I’m currently researching Edgar Allan Poe, and I recently read Edgar A. Poe by Kenneth Silverman. I’ll have a review soon, but for now I’ll say that Poe was maybe not so easy to get along with. He was…intense. And also one of the most original authors ever. The guy single-handedly created the detective story.

I annotate while I read nonfiction because I’m searching for information, not trying to get lost in a story. I have my highlighters, gel pen, and book tabs by my side, and when something strikes me I annotate it. I’m not necessarily looking for something specific, although that can depend on where I am in the research process. I’ve made most of my best discoveries when I’ve allowed myself to peer into any nooks and crannies that catch my attention. For example, did you know that Madeline Usher from Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher has been interpreted as being a vampire? Hmm…

When I’m working with scholarly articles, I print them up and annotate them the same way, with highlighters, gel pen, and tabs. Sometimes I color-code my annotations, especially when I’m researching historical fiction. I might highlight information about food blue, clothing yellow, hairstyles pink, etc, to make it easier to find what I need. 

Annotating an Ebook

I read on my Kindle a lot, and it’s easy to annotate an ebook. Press down and drag your finger across the text that you want to highlight. You can even choose different highlight colors. Then you can just click on the notes icon and type in your thoughts about the highlighted text.

Aesthetic Annotating

The more comfortable I’ve become with annotating books, the more I like my annotations to look nice. I prefer pretty-colored highlighters and book tabs. I use highlighters from Mr. Pen along with the matching book tabs. I also use Mildliner highlighters. I also use the garden variety fluorescent highlighters; you know, the ones you can buy a dozen for a few bucks. I also use those Post-it tabs you can buy anywhere.

Sometimes I’ll pick a color and do all of my highlighting and tabbing the same color. Sometimes I’ll try to match my highlighting and book tabs to the cover of the book. Sometimes I do whatever. 

There’s no right way to annotate. Some people use just a pencil or a ballpoint pen to mark up their books. Some people use yellow highlighters. Some people dog-ear the pages they’re interested in. The simpler you can keep your annotating process, the more likely you are to keep it up. 

Annotation Inspirations

If you’d like some inspiration for aesthetic annotating, check out Cath at Cups and Thoughts. I love watching her cozy annotation videos. I love seeing her passion for the stories she loves, and I love watching her engage with her reading. Ben McEvoy also has a great video about the value of marginalia. 

If you’re not in the habit of annotating text, I highly recommend you give it a try. You might be surprised by how much more you appreciate what you’ve read.