Reading is not a merit in itself. Reading a lot does not make you more lucid or a better person. If in the end you only remember a summary, that is not a memory failure, it is how the brain works. It retains ideas, not pages. The value is not in accumulating books read, but in what changes after you close one.

The act of reading is overvalued and judgment is undervalued. There is a lot of filler, padding, and author ego. Many books could be a long article and lose nothing. Reading makes sense when it organizes an idea or clarifies a way of thinking. The rest is cultural noise.