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Americans Read Fewer Books
DesScorp writes "The National Endowment for the Arts has released a study that shows a decline in the reading of fiction, poetry, and short stories. The study began in 1982, but shows a particularly steep decline from 1992-2002, the first decade of the Age of the Internet. They never seem to draw the conclusion that the Net may have accelerated our turn from this kind of reading, but the timing seems suspicious to me. I know I don't read for pleasure as much as I did years ago because of the time spent on the Net (and in technical books). NPR has a good audio link here for you non-readers; the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has a nice article as well." You could also - assuming you read - see the study itself.
Have you tried Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin? That and the two subsequent books rocked my socks...this coming from someone who could never get passed the first 100 pages of Eye of the World. I mean come on, "Mountains of Dhoom"? That's just not trying very hard.
I am American... allow me to repost a post of mine to another forum (#indie.torrents), the topic of which was "Read any good books lately?"
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I have been putting away book after book lately, but here are the good ones I've read recently:
Tolstoy - Anna Karenina (Not as good as War and Peace, and certainly has less indie-cred now that the Pevear and Volokhonsky translation has been added to Oprah's book club, but still a fantastic read).
Nabokov - Lolita, Pale Fire, Pnin, and Look at the Harlequins (The latter being my favorite, after Lolita, is best read after having read a number of his other works. It is quasi-autobiographical in nature.)
Proust - In Search of Lost Time AKA A Remembrance of Things Past AKA La Recherche du Temps Perdu (Attempting to plow my way through this tome while I still have a stomach for long novels, good so far.)
Mark Leyner - My Cousin, My Gastroenterologist , The Tetherballs of Bougainville, Tooth Imprints on a Corn Dog (My Cousin is the best book I've read in the last 18 months that couldn't yet be considered a "classic". FANTASTIC stuff, all of it. I have yet to read his other book Et Tu, Babe, but I have high hopes for it).
Charles Portis - Dog of the South, Masters of Atlantis (the latter is particularly dry and witty)
Jonathan Franzen - The Corrections (great book, almost an Oprah pick: http://dir.salon.com/books/feature/2001/10/26/fra
Jonathan Lethem - Motherless Brooklyn, Fortress of Solitude (the former is entertaining, if a bit gimmicky; the latter I haven't read but hear is good.)
Jeffrey Eugenides - Middlesex (Book from a couple of years ago, by the guy who did Virgin Suicides. Excellent book with creative plot. Not gimmicky at all.)
Steve Martin - The Pleasure of My Company, Shopgirl (the former started off a touch lamely but the main character quickly becomes quirkily sympathetic' Shopgirl is on my soon-to-read-but-alas-not-yet-read list.)
Arthur Nersesian - The Fuck-Up ("quintessential" New York hard-up tale? Maybe. But it may also be the book with the most indie-cred that you're likely to find in your local McBorder's.)
J.D. Salinger - Franny and Zooey, Raise High The Roof Beams Carpenter, 9 Stories, 22 Stories (Everyone seems to mention Catcher in the Rye. Don't get me wrong, it's a fantastic novella. But Franny and Zooey really shook me to the core. I think this book is in my top 5 books most influential on my everyday outlook on things, and this is coming from someone who's read all the Biggies. The other books are all really great, and Seymour Glass, hell the Glass family in general, is one of the most delightful creations in all of modern literature. 22 stories is a bootleg copy of unreleased or difficult to find Salinger stories that I picked up in both real and electronic form a few years back. If someone wants me to email them a copy, I can probably rustle it up.)
If you like food and wine:
Hugh Johnson - The Story of Wine (a classic)
Koneman - Culinaria: France, Culinaria: Hungary (the culinaria series are part cookbooks, part cultural studies, they survey in depth and pictorially the food culture of a particular country. An amazing series, though oft-poorly translated.)
Public libraries are one of the few public institutions we have that break down economic barriers to gaining knowledge.
Think about that during the next mil levy.
-Peter
. Penguins Surely Ca
Reading doesn't change any of that. I do read and I read many different things from fiction to poems to more technical books. None of it has had any affect on my spelling or grammar.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
They make it sound like not reading fiction and poetry is a bad thing. Well, not to me it isn't. Life is short, and I'd rather spend what little free time I have consuming real, *useful* information, i.e. non-fiction. Scientific papers in my field, essays, even philosophy, it's all good. But fiction? Who the hell needs that?
This seems like as good a place as any to throw in a plug for Project Gutenberg (old books for free!) and the Internet Booklist (a good place to go if you don't know what to read).
-jim
My local library doesnt carry any star trek or HGTTG books.
I won't comment on your choice of reading material, since mine is pretty dubious too. But...have you asked them about it? How are they to know that local people are interested in these books if local people don't ask them about these books? Most librarians would rather carry books that get used and read than books that sit around gathering dust, but won't know what you want unless you tell them.
Also, most libraries have agreements to share books with other libraries in the area, and you can usually check for books you're interested in through the library computer system. Maybe your local library doesn't have the books you want, but maybe the one in the next town does, and will happily ship them over for you if you just ask.
mass-produced works that the bourgeoise could purchase.
The bourgeoisie is the evil industrial class that has to be overthrown. I think you mean the proletariat
Would that mean you didn't actually read Marx? Oh, the irony!
In Repressive Burma, it's not just your connection that dies. slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=314547&cid=20819199
absolutely agree on the heinlein, just got 4 of his books after reading stranger in a strange land, and i'm just floored by some of it. I especially reccomend his short stories collection "The Green Hills of Earth." While he gets alot wrong, he gets a surprising amount right, given when he wrote it (late forties early fifties) Reading this stuff makes me see why people thought after the moon landing that moon colonies were coming. "Job: A comedy of justice" is quite good as well, though i dont think it really belongs in sci-fi, reminded me of Neil Gaiman's "american gods" alot actually. just about to start starship troopers, (mostly so i can be intellectual and condescending when i talk about the movie;) ) though i'm looking forward to that and "The moon is a Harsh Mistress."
One thing that really catches my attention about his forties and fifties sci-fi are his views on workers rights, safety and fair contracts and such, in space and how reminescent of earlier booming industries were, like sailing or the industrial revolution and whatnot. Its not that he agrees with these things, its like they're just facts of life to him, whereas i couldnt imagine it happening today. And this got me to thinking about how hung up on safety our society is, and whether or not that prevents us from developing as far as we can. Or maybe this is more because of the economics of going to space are radically different from the burgeoning industries of the past, and we cant afford to let men waste their lives in pursuit of their dreams, rather than any humanitarian desires. After all, in one story heinlein puts the earth-moon rates at 30 bucks to a lb, granted 30 bucks might just have meant more to him than to me.
To keep this from getting modded off topic to hell, i'll add my two cents on the internet/computing vs. reading scenario. i've noticed i tend to shift between gaming and reading cycles, usually dependent of availability of new titles in either case. So maybe its just that the book has more competition for our time, especially in fantast and sci-fi, now that there is no longer only one way to inhabit our fantasy worlds. Though its definitely wishful thinking that this is the only reason, i think its definitely a contributing factor.
George RR Martin "Song of Fire and Ice" series, Robin Hobb "Farseer" series, Lynn Flewelling "The Bone Doll's Twin".
GRRM and Hobb especially are cruel to their characters. The characters make stupid mistakes, heroes are sometimes assholes, villains are interesting and occasionally sympathetic, it all makes for a very involving involving world. It doesn't hurt that their stories are kick ass high fantasy in a rich and obviously well researched setting.
Flewelling does a very good horror/fantasy twist - her writing is above average but not exceptional, but what I really love is the story and mood (her stuff before the Bone Dolls Twin is decent, but much more formulaic).
One thing I noticed is that as mails are not considered 'serious' written matter, people write Swiss-German in a phonetic way. The resulting text is as legible for a German as l33t-speak. On the other hand this form also enables the reader to figure out where the writer is from. Of course, this is mostly done by young people. I would not be surprised to see blogs written in Swiss-German...