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[!summary]Roland Barthes believed that making notes is not about collecting all knowledge but about helping you start writing. Notes should focus on your main questions or problems to guide your reading and thinking. The key is to use your notes actively, turning them into writing rather than just saving them.
Highlights
id978076956
I’ve been reflecting on something French philosopher Roland Barthes understood: notes aren’t about hoarding knowledge or building a perfect archive. They’re about getting to the real point—writing.
id978077102
French philosopher Roland Barthes, who used index cards (‘fiches’) extensively, recognised this. He understood that the purpose of scholarly notes is not: - to understand everything, - to remember everything, or - to record everything. No, the purpose of one’s notes, he held, is to start writing. Barthes wasn’t creating a knowledge bank. He was writing. He used his notes, sometimes several times over, as prompts, inspiration, and cues for his written and published output.
id978078137
use your note system to explore your enduring concerns, those issues and questions you find yourself returning to over and over.
id978078389
Extensive reading benefits greatly from having a focus like this. You read widely, only really concerning yourself with the problem (or problems) you bring to the text with you. This provides a framework for your note making and it renders the task manageable. Your list of key problems guides your note-making and helps clarify what really matters to you.
He experimentado algo de esto al leer junto con Obsidian, agregando citas, ideas y preguntas en notas nuevas o existentes. Me da una sensación muy nítida de estar construyendo algo, no tirando palabras al vacío.
id978079372
Over time I’ve reluctantly discovered that my notes are only as useful as what I do with them. Sure, they help me remember things, and to keep going where I left off. They are the space where I do my thinking — but crucially, provided I do it right, they help me write.