Professor Bloom’s book includes responses to why he reads profoundly. He asserts that reading is not just a pastime but a crucial tool for individuals to retain their capacity for independent thinking and form their judgments and opinions about themselves and their views, including the Preface and Prologue. He then demonstrates his ideas by using other authors he knows well in the rest of the book.

His answer to the question of why he read is that - it matters. He adds that if individuals are to retain any capacity to form their judgments and opinions, they must continue to read for themselves.

How they read, well or poorly, and what they read cannot depend wholly upon themselves, but why they read must be for and in their interest.