Why Do People Hate Reading?
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It’s difficult to imagine what our society would look like without written communication. While verbal communication preceded it as far as we know, writing things down is a centuries-old human practice. According to the Getty Center, the earliest known writing was created around 3400 B.C. Whether for record history or long-distance communication, we are and always have been reading. From carrier pigeons to telegrams to texts, humanity has been communicating through writing for almost all recorded history. Outside direct communication with each other, we read signs on the highway, social media posts, and less and less frequently, literature. Often, when I ask people if they’ve read anything good recently, they either reply by saying, “No, I don’t read much”, followed by “I never have the time” or “I don’t like to read.” It’s usually the latter response that confuses me the most. We’re reading all the time, and we grow up reading books in school, so what makes the pages in a book unappealing? I rarely ask that out loud, as I don’t make a habit of interrogating people’s likes and dislikes, but when I do, I usually get the response, “Reading is boring,” or “I don’t have the attention span.”
It may seem obvious now that I like to read. I always have. In elementary school, I always looked forward to independent reading time. Today’s memes of Canadian rapper Drake holding a book remind us it was sacrilege to speak during that sacred time, making me nostalgic for the days I felt the same way. I’ve always remembered my classmates liking it too. I remember discussing books with peers in elementary school; Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Captain Underpants, Goosebumps, Flat Stanley, or The Magic Treehouse, and what we planned to buy at the much-anticipated Scholastic Book Fair. In the age where parents and legislators can ban books from school libraries with ease, memories of that time give me a sense of warmth and gratitude that I could freely express my love of reading with other people and not feel like the odd one out.
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I don’t mean to imply that I’m some sort of social pariah because I visit Barnes & Noble on occasion, but it seems like reading has gone increasingly out of fashion as time has gone on. I remember that during free time in middle and high school, people would look at me strangely for pulling out a book or a graphic novel instead of my phone. Granted, I wasn’t outcasted or scolded for it. In fact, most of the interactions surrounding it would be questions of what I was reading. It’s admittedly easy to say I don’t blame them. What could some bound-together tree pulp offer that is more interesting than all the world’s information on a pocket-sized supercomputer?
I think part of the reason consuming literature is increasingly uncommon is that other forms of media make literature look small. What are words on paper when you can experience the sights and sounds of the fictional world you want to immerse yourself in? Movies, TV shows, and video games are much more ubiquitous in today’s cultural consciousness than what is on the New York Times bestsellers list, and social media posts allow us to consume news in small fragments while we move on to the next bit of information.
However, I think that this is only part of the reason and a surface-level analysis. I’d argue that it’s mainly the fault of the education system, in America at least. Post-elementary school, it’s rare to dedicate time specifically to reading literature of the student’s choice. Usually, the curriculum has a set selection of books that will be covered over the course of the school year and analyzed by students. Usually, English classes will only include literature written by Shakespeare or pieces from the 19th and 20th centuries. I’ve had many conversations about reading works like Animal Farm, 1984, Hamlet, Romeo & Juliet, Lord of the Flies, The Great Gatsby, or To Kill a Mockingbird in middle and high school but they’re usually conversations with a negative connotation.
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Regardless of anyone’s individual opinion on these books as works of art, it’s hard to derive any enjoyment from reading them when you are made to read them in regimented sections by the page number or chapter, only think about certain aspects of the literature, and only write a certain number of words about it. I doubt Orwell or Shakespeare intended for their writing to be consumed this way. I assume all authors hope their works have some longevity and are considered worthy of analysis, but for it to be routinely tossed into a mandatory, rigid curriculum year after year is hardly how even the most passionate of aficionados enjoy any form of art.
Most of us know that reading is important and that it’s good for our brains, but once we get out of high school or college, we bid all forms of literature good riddance from our lives. When we graduate, we are free of the fear of not reaching a certain page number before class or writing a certain number of words on a piece of literature we are not interested in. But the giddy anticipation of independent reading time, the Scholastic Book Fair, and the next installment of series like Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Captain Underpants tells me that reading isn’t some obsolete form of learning we are supposed to grow out of as technology evolves nor something reserved for intellectuals in academia. Instead, it’s unfortunately a form of media that is beaten into our youth, causing us to reject it. But reading can be fun, creating the sights and sounds of a world entirely in your head and giving you nuanced information on a concept you can’t get from a Google search. It’s just a shame that they’ve been taught to hate it despite its benefits.
Strike Out,
Writer: Matías Civita
Editor: Cristina Angee
Tallahassee