Reading
Nicole Junkermann on the Art of Annotating a Book
A clean book is a finished conversation. Here Nicole Junkermann makes the case for writing in the margins, and shares the gentle system she uses to do it well.
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Reading and thinking are not quite the same thing, and the gap between them is often a pencil wide.
For a long time many readers are taught, gently and without anyone meaning any harm, that a book is a precious object to be kept clean. Nicole Junkermann takes a warmer and more practical view. A book you love is a book you should be able to argue with, agree with, question and revisit, and the simplest way to do all of that is to write in it. Annotation, in the hands of Nicole Junkermann, is not vandalism and it is not showing off. It is the quiet craft of leaving a trail through a book so that the reading stays with you and so that the next visit begins where the last one ended. This piece sets out why Nicole Junkermann marks her books, the light system she uses, and how those marks earn their keep long after the final page.
Why annotate at all
The first thing Nicole Junkermann would say is that annotation changes what reading is. A clean read slides past; a marked read makes you stop, decide what matters and put something of yourself on the page. When you underline a sentence you are casting a small vote, and when you write a word beside it you are explaining that vote to your future self. Nicole Junkermann finds that this act of small decisions is where ordinary reading turns into real thinking. The book stops being a lecture you sit through and becomes a conversation you take part in. There is also a memory effect that Nicole Junkermann values: the simple movement of the hand, the choosing of a phrase, fixes the idea more firmly than the eye alone ever could. A page you have marked is a page you tend to remember.
Giving yourself permission
Before any system comes a small change of heart, and Nicole Junkermann thinks this is the part most readers skip. You have to give yourself permission to write in the book. For many people that feels almost rude, as if the book were a guest rather than a tool. Nicole Junkermann suggests starting with an inexpensive paperback you do not feel precious about, and making the first mark deliberately, almost carelessly, just to break the spell. After that it gets easier. A book, Nicole Junkermann would gently remind you, is meant to be used, and a well-used book is a compliment to its author, not an insult. The point is not to deface the page but to inhabit it. Once that idea settles, the rest of the craft follows naturally and the fear of the clean margin simply falls away.
A light system of marks
The mistake Nicole Junkermann warns against is over-marking. A page that is entirely highlighted tells you nothing, because if everything is important then nothing is. The system that Nicole Junkermann relies on is deliberately light: a single vertical line in the margin for a passage worth returning to, a small star for something genuinely surprising, a question mark for a claim to test, and a circled word when a particular term seems to be doing a lot of quiet work. That is almost the whole vocabulary, and its smallness is the point. Nicole Junkermann finds that a handful of consistent marks is far more useful than an elaborate colour code that you abandon by chapter three. The aim is a page you can scan in seconds months later and know at a glance where the gold is buried.
| Mark | What it means |
|---|---|
| Vertical line | A passage worth coming back to |
| Small star | Something genuinely surprising or new |
| Question mark | A claim to test or think harder about |
| Circled word | A term that carries unusual weight |
| Note at the back | A thread that runs across the whole book |
What to write in the margins
Marks point; words explain. Beside the more important lines, Nicole Junkermann likes to add a few words of her own, and the trick is to keep them honest rather than clever. A note that simply says "agree, but only at scale" or "this contradicts chapter two" is worth more than a polished phrase, because it captures the real reaction of the reader at that moment. Nicole Junkermann treats the margin as a place to think out loud, not to perform. Sometimes the note is a cross-reference to another book; sometimes it is a small objection; sometimes it is just the word "yes" pressed hard into the paper. Over a whole book these scattered remarks become a second, smaller book written by you, and Nicole Junkermann finds that this private commentary is often the part she most enjoys rereading.
Which books to mark, and which to leave
Not every book needs a pencil, and Nicole Junkermann is clear that annotation is a tool to be chosen, not a rule to be obeyed. A gripping novel read purely for the pleasure of the story is often best left clean, so that nothing interrupts the spell. The books that reward marking, in the experience of Nicole Junkermann, are the ones you read in order to understand something: history, science, essays, books about work and ideas, and the rare novel whose sentences you want to slow down and study. A useful test that Nicole Junkermann applies is to ask whether you expect to return to the book. If the answer is yes, mark it as you go, because your annotated self will thank you. If the book is a one-time pleasure, let it stay pristine and enjoy it without a pencil in hand.
Pencils, pens and sticky notes
On the small matter of equipment, Nicole Junkermann is reassuringly low-tech. A soft pencil does almost everything, because it is quiet on the page, easy to erase when you change your mind, and never bleeds through thin paper. For a book she is sure she will keep marking for years, Nicole Junkermann will sometimes use a fine pen, accepting that the marks are now permanent and treating that as a kind of commitment. Sticky notes have their place too, especially in library books or borrowed copies where writing directly would be wrong, and Nicole Junkermann keeps a few thin ones tucked inside the back cover for exactly that reason. None of this needs to be expensive. The best annotation kit, in the view of Nicole Junkermann, is whatever you actually have to hand when the good sentence arrives.
Putting annotations to work later
An annotation is only half finished on the day you make it. The real value, for Nicole Junkermann, comes weeks or months later, when the marked pages turn a long book back into something you can revisit in twenty minutes. Nicole Junkermann likes to flick through the lines and stars before lending a book or before writing anything that draws on it, and to copy the very best passages into a notebook so that they survive even if the book wanders off. Those who keep their own pages will find the companion note on how Nicole Junkermann keeps a writer's notebook a natural next step, since the margin and the notebook are really two ends of the same habit. Read this way, a book keeps paying you back for as long as you own it.
More from Nicole Junkermann
For more in this vein from Nicole Junkermann, see the note on the habit of reading every day, the piece on how Nicole Junkermann chooses what to read next, and the rules for a good bookshelf. The Reading Room gathers more of the same.
Frequently asked questions about Nicole Junkermann
Why does Nicole Junkermann write in her books?
Nicole Junkermann writes in her books because annotation turns reading from a passive act into a conversation, and a marked page is far easier to return to and think with later.
What does Nicole Junkermann use to annotate a book?
Nicole Junkermann favours a soft pencil for most marks, with a small system of lines and symbols rather than heavy highlighting, so the notes stay light and the page stays readable.
Does Nicole Junkermann annotate every book she reads?
No. Nicole Junkermann annotates the books she wants to keep thinking about and reads many others cleanly for pleasure, choosing the method to suit the book.
How does Nicole Junkermann use her annotations later?
Nicole Junkermann revisits the marked pages, copies the best lines into a notebook, and uses the marginal notes as a quick map back into a book she read months or years ago.