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From Times Higher Education…

“Do you read a book a week?” a student asked me one day in class, a note of sarcasm colouring his frustration with the course’s reading load.

“No,” I said, after a suitable pause. “I don’t read a book a week. I read four or five books a week.”

Usually I would not have responded at all, but I felt that the other students deserved to hear my answer because implicit in his question was a dismissal of the importance of books – not just in my life, but also in the lives of many of his peers.

My teaching career was far advanced before it occurred to me that reading – deep reading – might need any defence. I have always looked upon interacting with the written word as a natural and indispensable part of life that, like breathing, requires no justification. Yet all too often I encounter students who cannot name the last book they read for pleasure; neither, for that matter, can many adults, and I am frequently struck by how many otherwise handsomely appointed homes have no books in sight.

This decline in the frequency and breadth of reading among the general population stems, at least in part, from the dramatic shift in priorities and lifestyles that has occurred since the close of the 19th century, a shift driven by the engines of commerce and technology. The causes are complex, but a few factors seem painfully clear to me. More…

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