To generalize, こと is used in this case to make a verb behave like a noun. It is much like “-ing” in English, but that’s an over-simplification. Once you’ve done that you can attribute other things to it, like saying 読むことが好きだ
Another common example you may see is expressing the ability to do something, in the form 「dict. verb」こと が できる
This isn’t the only means of expressing such things, as you’ll sometimes see の serving a similar role as こと but its usage is a little different. The TF lesson on nominalization goes into more detail on that, however.
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This reply was modified 11 years, 6 months ago by Jason.