The Middling Place

The Middling Place

The Reading Habit That Changed How I Understand Books

How a pencil, a few questions, and a margin can transform the way you read

Sabrina Nesbitt | PhD student's avatar
Sabrina Nesbitt | PhD student
Jun 09, 2026
∙ Paid

I picked up my old copy of The Picture of Dorian Gray recently. The dark brown paperback is so scuffed that the edges are more a taupe color now. The pages are water-warped from a rainy day in California long ago and make that crinkling sound when you turn them. Inside the novel are the various iterations of my handwriting throughout the last decade or …

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