It's not that you forget the content, it's that you forget how to phrase it concisely. If the author needed 70, or 200 pages to explain a concept, and you can at some point raise your hand and claim 'I get the point', it's not reasonable to expect a 12-word summary. What do I remember? Hard to put into words. Likewise, it's not reasonable to expect a perfect memory, reciting paragraph after paragraph of the original text.
If you really can summarize a book in a sentence or two, wouldn't the author have done that already?
Maybe it's time for me to reread Cryptonomicon. There are parts of that book I have absolutely no memory of, flipping through it, yet other parts I remember all too often (bicycle sprockets, comets of pee, bisecting alligators, van eck phreaking).
> If you really can summarize a book in a sentence or two, wouldn't the author have done that already?
Not only is this possible to do, but it's often done. The problem is that it's not necessarily useful or sufficient to hear a mere summary of something.
For example, let's say I tell you that "Idea X is important." That's a simple idea, right? It only too me four words to express it. But do you believe me? Probably not, because I haven't spent any time or effort convincing you that idea X is important. And do you understand what idea X is? Probably not, because I haven't spent any time or effort explaining that. Etc.
Even if you can summarize it, you probably need to write the entire book for people to get the background information necessary for them to find your summary useful, otherwise it will go in one ear and out the other.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say this has absolutely nothing to do with what PG was referencing in the article. I'm guessing he could at least give some broad overview of the book he's referencing. The issue seems to be that it seems so small in comparison to the book itself.
Well, exactly. The book as a whole accomplishes much more than a brief summary of it does, which is why it feels bad to lose all of that additional information.
I disagree with the parent that you still remember the content but can't summarize it concisely. I believe the opposite: you forget the specifics but retain the ability to summarize them.
If you really can summarize a book in a sentence or two, wouldn't the author have done that already?
Maybe it's time for me to reread Cryptonomicon. There are parts of that book I have absolutely no memory of, flipping through it, yet other parts I remember all too often (bicycle sprockets, comets of pee, bisecting alligators, van eck phreaking).
(also... > seige warfare ?)