ABSTRACT
Whether commonplacing or annotating, English readers, as we have seen, responded in an immense variety of ways to their experiences with the texts associated with the Scottish Enlightenment. Some attempted to refute what they read. Others were inspired, usually with the best of intentions, to try to enhance what had actually been written. Most often, though, readers sought to identify in some sense with the words and ideas they had encountered—even, on occasion, venturing parody or imitation of the author’s peculiarities. It may therefore be that we should conceptualise reading not merely as a passive experience but as an active performance in which texts come to be appropriated by individuals for essentially personal and, it would appear, invariably highly specific purposes. Yet if this is fair, it would also be necessary to add the crucial rider that taking possession of what an author has written never leaves the person who embarks upon it completely unmoved.
