Dr. Norlie read extensively in the preparation of his thesis, and writes as a student of books, rather than as one who has had experience in teaching or in public reading. His purpose is "to tell how to read aloud." "Expressive reading is the utterance of the message of a selection in a natural and effective way. By natural is meant that the utterance should be in the reader's conversational tone, or as near to it as the message and the occasion will permit. By effective is meant that the utterance shall be given with an emphasis suited to bring out the message for the occasion. By message is meant the thought and feeling and purpose of the author." In his preface he reviews the attempts that have been made to discover the principles underlying expressive reading, and the methods used to teach it; and in his thesis he develops four of these principles that he finds to be essential. These are, Getting a Perspective; Studying the Details; Drill; and Criticism. Getting the Perspective means a study of the author's life, character and relation to his times; the occasion and purpose of the selection; its thought and feeling; and its form. Studying the Details is finding the meaning and pronunciation of the words, their grouping, and the central idea of each' group. Drill is chiefly mental, recalling the setting, the contents and the exact words. Criticism is the comparison of the reading with the reader's conversational style. This is his criterion of expressive reading, and would naturally be the end of the thesis; but he adds twenty pages of description of the organs of speech, and finishes by giving more than a third of the book to phonetics.
–The Princeton Theological Review, Vol. 17
