BBC radio host and best-selling author Matthew Syed interviewed me about Evelyn Wood for an episode of his program, “Sideways.” The segment about Evelyn Wood Reading Dynamics begins at point 06:45 of the episode, as we travel back to 1961 to the set of the TV game show, “I’ve Got a Secret.”
I’m excited and honored to be part of a BBC show. Incidentally, Evelyn Wood Reading Dynamics opened a branch in London, but it never really took off. At 55 guineas (more than $1,000 today) for eight three-hour lessons, the price struck the Times Literary Supplement as “prohibitive,”, particularly for students. Characteristically, Evelyn Wood responded, “When people want something, they get it.”
In the end, the UK branch of Evelyn Wood had to peddle its wares to Americans instead, selling courses on British history and English culture and literature. To their credit, the British public wasn’t sold on speed-reading, at least not at the prices quoted.
