# Read
By pressing r you can read something.
NetHack allows you to read objects in your inventory:

fortune cookies, to read the fortune without eating the cookie.
T-shirts, and in 3.6.0, aprons, to examine the message on each item.
scrolls, to activate them.
spellbooks, to study them.[1]
credit cards
magic markers
gold pieces
the Orb of Fate
candy bars
You can try unsuccessfully to read other classes of objects.
In vanilla NetHack, you automatically read any floor engravings or headstones that you encounter. This does not use the r command, nor does it break illiterate conduct. (Though reading an engraving does not break the conduct, writing one does.)

NetHack brass
In NetHack brass, you automatically read any floor engravings, but not headstones.[2] To read headstones, press r and then answer y to the question, "Do you want to read an epitaph on the grave?" In brass 040923, reading the epitaph does not break illiterate conduct.

SLASH'EM
SLASH'EM requires you to explicitly read floor engravings and headstones, by pressing r. Doing so breaks the illiterate conduct.[3]
By pressing r then ,, you can read objects that are on the floor. Thus, if you suddenly need to flee and you have no empty inventory slots, but luckily found a scroll of teleportation on the floor, SLASH'EM lets you activate it.
SLASH'EM lets you "read" rings. This is a feature to check the color of rings that you are currently wearing, otherwise "You can't see it!" or "Perhaps you should put it on first." Currently, only a mood ring will glow with color; any other ring gives the message, "There seems to be nothing special about this ring."[4]

References

↑ read.c

↑ NetHack brass 040923/engrave.c#line212

↑ engrave.c in SLASH'EM 0.0.7E7F2, line 372

↑ read.c in SLASH'EM 0.0.7E7F2, line 80

This page may need to be updated for the current version of NetHack.
It may contain text specific to NetHack 3.4.3. Information on this page may be out of date.
Editors: After reviewing this page and making necessary edits, please change the {{nethack-343}} tag to the current version's tag or {{noversion}} as appropriate.