Went to Barnes & Noble today on my lunch break: Just picked up a few things to read…
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In an article dated Wednesday, October 24, from The Baltimore Sun by Reuters, apparently teens & college-age adults are reading, and folks in their 30s are the largest percentage of those utilizing e-readers. To see the details of the article, click here.
The statistics regarding reading are pretty good, and it’s encouraging, especially for someone who is (a) a writing professor, and (b) a writer. It’s imperative that we keep people reading, and quite frankly, though I’m still one of those “book with paper” kind of people, as long as people are reading, I don’t care by what means they do it, but that they do it. The point is to engage in reading.
My students are probably sick of hearing me say it, but you can’t be a good writer unless you are a good reader. Reading anything helps, whether you’re reading magazines, newspapers, non-fiction, fiction, or classic works of literature: find what you like and read. Reading other people’s works offers you the opportunity to see style, enhance your vocabulary, see creativity in action, and become engrossed in storytelling. Reading opens your mind to new adventures, insights, opinions, and situations. As James Bryce once said, “The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it.”
I’m actually amazed some nights when I go to watch television, and I end up surfing and surfing, unable to find something that whets my appetite. Even though I read papers all day long and talk about writing, I still like to curl up with a good book.
And, I’m in the process of writing my second book. I spend a lot of time researching and reading to help me build a story and a character.
I’m delighted by this news, and hope that more and more people become inspired to read works by authors, both local and best-selling authors. Supporting writers is important, for if there were no readers, we would be no more.
