What Happened to Your Reading Life?
My husband and I were a Match.com pair made in heaven. Twenty years ago, when we met, I was a public school reading specialist, and he was a rare book dealer. We clicked immediately at our first rendezvous, and we’ve been going strong ever since! Our home is full of books. My shelves hold life-changing fiction, the spiritual, and the esoteric. His collection emphasizes history, personal redemption stories, and antiquarian books.
The iPad Took Over Our Reading Life
A few weeks ago, I noticed that we had stopped regularly reading books. We both have iPads, due to the discontinuation of newspaper delivery in our semi-rural area. As anyone living in the modern age knows, those devices are like “crack,” luring us in with the news, connections to friends and family, and a quick source for research of anything our Magic 8 Ball brains can conjure.
According to a July 2021 Thinkwithgoogle.com post, a majority of seniors spend 6 hours each day online, mainly using devices to stay in touch with others, to organize finances, and to improve health and wellness.
I must admit our purposes for using the iPads don’t match our demographic, but those devices still get a workout! We are Never-Social-Media-Seniors. But I am following trusted news sites all through the day, and my husband is completing business-related tasks, such as researching and buying photos and ephemera.
What Do the Statistics Say About Reading Books?
The statistics vary, but here is a sampling. In an effort not to be a book snob, all formats of book reading are considered equal: physical books, e-books, and audio books.
In 2023, according to an Economist/YouGov poll, out of 1500 respondents, 46% read zero books and 5% read 1 book. The news is a bit rosier for boomers. According to a July 2022 Wordsrated.com survey, our demographic read, on average, 9.54 books per year. I know my husband and I are easily in that cohort, but as two people who earned their livings as literary cheerleaders, we were hanging our heads in shame, because our iPads superseded books daily.
How Is Internet Reading Different Than Book Reading?
As someone who has spent the greater part of her adult life teaching people to skim and scan, it is no surprise that internet reading is quick, but shallow. It is more of a searching process topped off with a layer of evaluation. It is somewhat like browsing in an enormous store, but with unending distractions: pop-up adds, I’m talking to you!
Book reading is a much deeper process. The reader is engaging with the text in a thoughtful manner. There is critical reflection, the drawing of inferences, implicit meanings to discover, and personal connections to make. It is a slow journey, rather than a quick romp.
What Is the Value of Reading Books?
No doubt anyone who has ever fallen in love with a book has noticed its “immersive” quality. Immersion is that feeling which transports the reader into the story and makes them feel as if they are there!
How is this done? Books have a full menu of sensory detail and provide strong connections to character and setting. They poke the reader’s emotions and encourage movie-like visualizations. The good ones are unpredictable and pique our curiosity!
What Type of Reader Are You?
Kaelyn Barron on tckpublishing.com describes 15 types of readers. Can you find yourself in this grouping? The Serial Binge Reader is like her counterpart bingeing Netflix offerings each evening. Once she gets her hands on an author or genre, she can’t hold back!
The Highbrow eschews mass market books and those intended for beach reading. Ms. Fickle tires easily, and jumps from book to book without finishing most. The Nonfiction Nerd doesn’t want to waste time reading fiction, because there is never enough time to learn something new. The Catharsis Seeker is always looking for her elusive self in other characters.
Other reading types include: the E-book Denier, the Film Buff, the Repeat Reader, the Book Clubber, the Vacation Reader and the Hopeless Romantic.
The Case Is Made, But Where Is the Road Back?
A regular habit of leisurely reading books is an enduring lifestyle. It implies intellect, curiosity, patience, and commitment. The signs in a home are unmistakable: cozy chairs, warm throws, the right lighting, and of course the ubiquitous bookshelves, maybe in most rooms of the house!
If book reading is not happening in this stage of your life, oddly enough, suggestions abound online!
- Keep a book bucket list.
- Carry a book with you during auspicious occasions such as a long commute or a visit to a doctor’s office.
- Don’t feel pressure to finish a bad book.
- Carve out a regular no-screen time of day for reading.
- Read a variety of genres at the same time; some genres require a smaller time commitment.
- Get comfy – the right chair, the right lighting, a cozy wrap.
- Set a personal goal of how many pages or a specific amount of time you will read at the beginning of each session.
- Try different formats – audiobooks, e-books, physical books.
We’ve all been alive for decades before the internet and screens were invented. No doubt there is a glorious pool of memories of the many book experiences we’ve had as children and adults. Do you remember bringing home the maximum number of books allowed from the library on a lazy summer day? Are there a few pivotal books that still remain in your heart? Can you remember moments of unexplained serendipity in a bookstore? It just may be time to revive your literary life!
Let’s Have a Conversation:
Do you still consider yourself a “reader?” Is that term current for you? What obstacles make reading books more difficult? When was the last time you browsed the bookstore or library and ended up with a stack you wanted to buy/check out?
Tags Books
I keep telling myself I don’t “need” to buy more books……… I’m currently waiting for the postie to bring me a trilogy . I have 4 books on the go at the moment…. . I have no hesitation in binning a book; if I get one quarter of the way through and I’m struggling with it, then it isn’t worthy of shelf space or any more of my time. Life without good deep immersive books is unthinkable!! Proper books; books that don’t need to be recharged or downloaded, always ready for you. I used to keep a big omnibus of poetry permanently in the car and dip into it every afternoon while waiting in the school carpark……. That battered tattered volume is still on my shelves and still referred to. (Thomas Wyatt, you wrote some exquisite verses.) Equally, there is a place for the frivolous light reading when you want to be taken away without much effort or concentration…… I just can’t imagine a life without books!
I’m a Fickle reader. I have so many just started books and I always intend to finish them but I keep bringing home other books that seem to pop out and say “take me”. I want to read the bible, again, I’m interested in the differences between men and women, meditation, so many many subjects, but sometimes I just like to read an enjoyable novel that keeps me turning the pages. I have a boyfriend who likes to watch many hours of TV at night and sometimes I am just bored with it all. I’d rather read.
I read daily and enjoy it. I keep a list and I loan my books to my friend and she also loans out hers.we put our address labels on the ones we want returned.if I find a book at yard sale or thrift store and it is part of a series I order it from library to read the others. I have read on tablet but holding a book is better for me.thanks for your article.
Thrift stores!!!! Can’t resist browsing the book aisles, full of recent hard-bound best-sellers
and yellowed, paperback unknowns. If you decide you don’t like the book, you’ve spent 25 cents and take it back sometime.
A few years back, I told my financially struggling son, “Go to Good Will and bring me a bunch of take-me-away old novels to take my mind off my job.” It touched me deeply when he brought me: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Treasure Island, The Adventures of
Huckleberry Finn, and so on. Just because we read them when we were 14 doesn’t mean
we can’t LOVE reading them today. Now I’m reading “The Virginian” and “Jane Eyre” on alternating nights, enjoying my time travel. [And by the way, my idea is great for grand-
children who want to get you a gift. Ask them to write something to you in the front of the book and you will treasure it. Another idea: when my son was away at college, I would find
out what books he was reading for various English or Literature classes; then, I would go
buy the book and it was a way for us have our 2-person book club—especially because reading “The Joy Luck Club” was not his thing. I could tutor him from a distance.
Thrift and charity shops are also great places to find out of print books. I would often browse in them for old history books when I was taking my degree 30 years ago.
I learned to love books from my father. On many Saturdays, we would spend the afternoon together at the local library. Although I have tried other forms of books, I can say I’m still the old school type who likes the feel of a book in her hands. I like turning the pages and placing my book mark at the end of a chapter. I also would like to add that my granddaughter of 17 also loves to read and prefers books over internet reading.