Why scholarship stays silent
A university press monograph may sell a few hundred copies, many of them to libraries. Journal articles are not sold as books at all. No one pays a studio for that audience, so the reading that matters to you most is exactly the reading that is never narrated.
Turn the reading pile into listening
1.
Save the PDF from your library, the publisher or the repository. Or paste the link to an arXiv paper or an online article on the Create screen.
2.
Drop it here. Section headings become chapters; headers, footers and page numbers are dropped, and columns are joined back into paragraphs.
3.
Listen to the introduction and conclusion first, then decide what earns a close read.
Tips for academic listening
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Use the PDF view: each word lights up on the page, so you can glance at a figure without losing your place.
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Skip the reference list with the chapter markers.
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Pick a measured, clear narrator you could listen to for an hour.
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Bookmark passages to quote and pick them up at your desk. Your place follows you.
Questions people ask
How are footnotes, equations and references read?
As the text the file holds. Equations and tables are best checked on the page, and the chapter markers let you skip the bibliography.
Can I listen to arXiv papers without downloading them?
Yes. Paste the arXiv link or the link to an online article on the Create screen and it becomes a book in your library.
Is my unpublished draft private?
Yes. It stays in your private library, is used only to narrate it for you, and is gone when you delete it.
What about scanned journal articles?
They need a text layer, which many scanners and library services add. An image-only scan has no words to read.