January 25, 2008

On Reading

It's clear that I haven't been writing much lately. In part, it's because I've been spending more time reading.

A recent New Yorker article quantifies the decline of reading in our country. According to a research from the Census Bureau and the National Endowment for the Arts...in 1982, 56.9 percent of Americans had read a work of creative literature in the last 12 months. That proportion had dropped to 46.7 percent by 2002. And, according to the NEA chairman, "Poor reading skills correlate heavily with lack of employment, lower wages, and fewer opportunities for advancement."

We are all aware of the decline in newspaper readership. In 1970, there were 62.1 illion weekday newspapers in circulation...about 0.3 papers per person. By 2006, there were just 52.3 million, about 0.17 per person. A decline of almost 50 percent.

Book sales are also down....from 8.27 books per person in 2001, to 7.93 in 2006. The NEA reports that, adjusted for inflation, American household spending on books is near its 20-year low.

Not surprisingly, then, the average reading skills of young people are declining. The reading scores of twelfth graders fell an average of 6 points between 1992 and 2005...and the share of proficient twelfth-grade readers dropped from 40 percent to 35 percent. According to the article, "the deepest declines were in 'reading for literary experience' - the kind that involves 'exploring themes, events, character, settings, and the language of literary works.'"

The article goes on to say that this trend isn't confined to our country.

This decline affects us all. After all, according to the NEA, readers are more likely than non-readers to play sports, exercise, visit art museums, attend theater, paint, go to music events, take photographs, and volunteers. Proficient readers are also more likely to vote.

In his masterful play, The History Boys, Alan Bennett captures one of the joys of reading in a conversation between the wonderfully colorful teacher Hector and one of his students: "The best moments in reading," says Hector, "are when you come across something...a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things...that you'd thought special...particular to you. And here it is!...set down by someone else...a person you've never met...maybe even someone long dead...and it's as if a hand has come out and taken yours."

Do we really want to become a world of non-readers?