How to Love Reading Again

How to Love Reading Again

Have You Read Any Books Lately?

Who's Reading Books These Days?

An article in The Atlantic titled "Why Kids Aren't Falling in Love With Reading," has made its rounds through literary circles and English departments, which is where I first heard about its gloomy prospects for American readership today, or at least that's how it was presented to me. As a reader, writer, and writing teacher myself (listed in order of priority, of course), I went to read the article, hoping it would have some suggestions for getting young people to love literature again, eager to practice the principles of inquiry and curiosity that probably made me a reader in the first place.Unfortunately, I was met with a stern paywall and was unable to read the article about why people aren't reading anymore.I don't mean this bitterly. Maintaining one of the nation's oldest magazines comes with some costs. Writers, editors, distributors, and other staff deserve fair payment, and subscriptions are, in present circumstances, the most effective model. But it does make me wonder about the material side of the situation of low readership. As Jenny Odell has articulated so well in How to Do Nothing, the extreme version of "time is money" that defines the twenty-first century reduces the amount of time it takes to appreciate good literature. We no longer have hours to read chapters, but minutes to read paragraphs.The way literature is taught is often reduced to an efficiency-based model--students are taught to identify a book's theme and then find one (1) passage where the author says something about that theme. Likewise, the way we share literature online forces us to reduce short stories to pull quotes and memoirs to blurbs. Articulating the depth and complexity and nuance of a novel or a poetry collection is outright impossible in a single post.I don't know of any good solutions, nor am I certain that I understand the problem, its origins and scale and context. All I can say is this: I've been reading book review submissions for Atticus Review for just over a year, and the experience has made me realize just how many fantastic books are published, and how much work it takes for an indie book to reach even a fragment of its audience. 

Have you read any books? Have you enjoyed them? Do you want others to read them? If you answered yes to any of the above questions, I think you have a book review in the making. We read book reviews year-round, and submissions are always free. 

In the meantime, I hope you keep writing. The world needs it.

Peace,Keene ShortEditor-in-Chief

THIS WEEK AT ATTICUS

BOOK REVIEW

KEEPING TIME: THE NIGHT DRIVERS BY MELANIE MCCABE

A book review by

JESSICA DE KONINCK

"Siblings, for those of us fortunate to have them, are our mirrors, our models, our confidants, sometimes our dearest friends."

NEW FROM THE ATTIC

"Writing is a Way in Which I Take Care of Myself"Keene Short interviews Chelsey Clammer about her new book, HUMAN HEARTBEAT DETECTED, out now from Red Hen Press 

MY MOTHER SLIPS SCARVES INTO MY HANDEsther Sadoff

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