<p>Okay, I am the first one to admit it; I am a bookworm. From Dickens to Tolstoy to anything that doesn't include science fiction...I love it and read it.</p>
<p>Reading raises your vocabulary, or so it is supposed to? It doesn't to me. Should I read more carefully, paying closer attention to unknown words or pulling out a dictionary if I don't know a word instead of skipping it (like I was taught to - get the concept, and move on style)..</p>
<p>All it has done is caused me to go into the 1800s style of writing - LOOONGGG, WORDY SENTENCES. </p>
<p>To put it all to an end, am I reading incorrectly? </p>
<p>Haha. Yes, that question sounds ridiculous to me, too, but I need an answer.</p>
<p>Something about deriving the meaning from its context.
But if you're not sure about a certain word, I'd pull out a dictionary, it may have many meanings.</p>
<p>I would say to look up words you don't know, it really helps with vocab. Context clues are great, but nothing beats a dictionary. ANd if you don't want to leaf through the dictionary, just go to the website, dictionary.com</p>
<p>Yeah look up words you don't know and put them in a notebook. That should help build your vocabulary. </p>
<p>Reading is not so much about building a vocabulary (unless you define the unfamiliar words and make them your own), but it really helps in knowing how to use the vocabulary.</p>
<p>wow....i got that same problem...since i start reading victorian novels my writing style just became so verbose that my english teacher this semester just constantly gave me 80s on essays because of those extra long and convoluted sentences..</p>
<p>For Christmas, I asked for an electronic dictionary. It has helped me so much, you would not believe! It is very compact and useful. I take it everywhere I go (everywhere I read). I highly recommend getting one if you are an extreme reader.</p>
<p>There are a lot of really high quality electronic dictionaries and I think that it's worth it to get the slightly more expensive ones (they can have up to thousands more words). I got the sharp e550, which was $70 (pretty expensive) but I haven't found a single word in any book I've ever read, not in the dictionary. It also has science and geographical references. Whenever I don't know something, I always look it up first before doing anything else. If money is no issue, I recommend the Franklin 11th edition Speaking Collegiate dictionary. It even says the word for you! But alas, with it's $100 price tag, the sharp's pronounciation key is fine for me.</p>
<p>I have the same problem with baroque syntax and long, obscure words, probably from all those classics my parents foisted on me as an elementary school kid. I barely understood them at the time, but I think they've permanently warped my writing style. My teachers actually like it, though. They seem to think there's some sort of correlation between words-per-sentence and I.Q.</p>
<p>My writing used to be ridiculously complex. Now I realize how annoying it was to read at times and how long sentences aren't always synonymous with intelligence or good writing. It eventually just took a really amazing teacher to beat it out of me (not entirely, because sometimes it's just necessary and better to have a long sentence). I finally just realized that at times, the most powerful and hard-hitting sentences are those with just a few, VERY carefully selected words.</p>
<p>And personally, I prefer a traditional dictionary. Dictionary.com is good if I'm already online, but seriously, words in ink and on paper are sufficient.</p>
<p>^^^ That's an interesting point to consider...generally any scientific writing will be more technical in style and maybe that's just what you need, Optimization.</p>