Reader Writes - All About Books From a Reader's POV

Being a former English teacher, of course I've always been interested in people's reading experiences.  Now that I'm a writer, I'm even more fascinated to hear what books and reading mean to people.  I therefore thought I'd run a series of posts inviting readers, rather than writers, to talk about their likes and dislikes and what they look for when reading purely for pleasure.

I'm delighted to introduce my first guest, Ruth Sherrington, who is a dear friend and former teaching colleague of mine and therefore also has a keen interest in reading and strong views on the subject.  So, over to Ruth for...

A Reader's Point of View

The Buttercup Fairy by Barbara Campbell

I have always been a keen reader, and in fact I remember the nursery school principal being rather displeased with my mother because I was already reading fluently by the time I went there which meant that I was way out of step with their teaching schedule!  I particularly remember a book I loved called ‘The Buttercup Fairy’ which was about a fat fairy (I was rather round when I was little), but when I got older I started to read historical novels by writers such as Henry Treece and Rosemary Sutcliff which I absolutely loved.  I used to disappear into books and just not emerge until I had got to the end.  I read all of the Tolkien ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy before I was twelve, and have continued to read just as much all my life.  I have some favourite authors now, who include Graham Greene, D H Lawrence, George Orwell, Evelyn Waugh and Anne Bronte, but as I teach about books for a living I read widely and have learnt to appreciate the craft of all kinds of writers from Jilly Cooper to Jane Austen.  I often read ‘chick-lit’ for relaxation and I think it serves a useful social purpose by providing a kind of harmless escapism – much better than most of the films released nowadays, which I find are not often directed towards women’s concerns and issues.

Colin Firth as Mr Darcy

Filmed versions of novels don’t usually appeal to me because I believe that the reader works with the author to create the characters in his/her own mind, but I did enjoy the Colin Firth ‘Pride and Prejudice’, and also the Keira Knightley version, rather against my better judgement! 

I do think that reading is a matter of personal choice and that forcing children to read is counter-productive but that all little children should be read to (and with) from babyhood onwards, as I truly believe that this is where literacy begins and that it should be a birthright for all children.  I may be wrong but I think the huge increase in diagnoses of dyslexia may be connected to the fact that children are not so often encouraged to love and listen to words on the page from an early age.

To me e-books don’t really have the magic of paper books but I still find my e-reader really useful for downloading books when I need to read at short notice, for example when I get into bed and have nothing to read before I sleep.  But then I am the kind of person who reads the back of cornflake packets rather than have nothing to read, so I am a bit of a hopeless case when books are not available. 

Will Self

Toni Morrison

I really enjoy finding out how modern writers are taking the novel forward and have particularly enjoyed reading the work of Will Self and Toni Morrison in recent years – in fact my ideal literary dinner party guests would definitely include those two writers, the lovely Lyn Sofras and all the others mentioned above plus about thirty others, so I think I had better book a room at the Dorchester to fit them all in!

Why Don't Our Children Read Anymore?

The best memory I have of my childhood is curling up on the upstairs landing (which only I knew had the warmest radiator in the house) on those bleak and desultory days of the seemingly endless winter holidays and losing myself for hours on end in fictional realms.  TV was a paltry runner-up to the richness of my life in literature.  I lived it and breathed it right alongside the characters in whose lives and dramas some kindly author had invited me to partake.  The whole household could have collapsed about my ears and I would not have noticed.

I still frequently go AWOL from the real world when I become engrossed in a good story.  I suppose I simply have no self-control, but the pleasure of reading makes me realise how thin so many other modern pleasures are.  Read a good book and something permeates your soul and stays with you forever.  Which, of course, is why I’m so sad that so many of our children today are missing out on that wonderful gift.

By ‘our’ I’m referring to children in a collective or national sense.  You know, that ubiquitous ‘younger generation’ we oldies are all so worried about.  I have certainly been worrying about this increasing problem for the past decade, but not for the more obvious reasons.  My own son is an avid reader – always was, always will be.  When I watch him devour literature and see him reap the rewards of something he does purely for pleasure, I feel sad that so many other young people are missing out on a wonderful experience.

I’m sure that wherever you are in the country, you’ve participated at some point in these ‘Good As New’ sales organised so beautifully by dedicated volunteers raising money for cancer research or similar worthy charities.  These sales are a great way to dispose of good quality clothing, equipment, games and books while helping needy charities.  For one reason or another I had a great collection of (brand new) children’s literature I no longer needed, all written by wonderful, award-winning children’s authors.  I also had a collection of used Simpsons comic books.

I’d be disappointed in you if you didn’t know where I was going here!  What sold?  Yes of course, you guessed.  What was disappointing was that even at giveaway prices – a tiny fraction of their retail value - parents did not see the value of buying high quality literature for their children.  Incidentally, this sale was in one of the more affluent London suburbs and the car park was crammed to capacity by people-carriers carrying very few people.

As a former English teacher I’ve always been deeply concerned about the reading habits of the young.  Correction, what I really mean is ‘lack of reading habits’.   When I first began teaching – and believe it or not, that wasn’t back in the dark ages, reading was still considered to be acceptable, even pleasurable.  Libraries were the hub of the school and book fairs the highlight of the term.  When visiting authors came, the children would be held spellbound; happily spending their pocket money stocking up their bookshelves and writing appreciative fan letters en masse without any prompting. 

I myself ran school book-clubs and from the day they placed their order until the day of delivery, children would stop me in corridors and playground asking me when their book orders would arrive.  When I became head of English, my mission was not just to maintain that enthusiasm but to increase it.  I wanted parents to be more involved as well, in order to capture some of those reluctant readers in the net.  I spent three-quarters of my departmental budget on exciting new books which had all been carefully researched by caring staff and students.

But gradually I saw a decline in interest.  Children no longer wanted to read.  Year after year each new intake proved to be less literate than the last and even less interested in reading.  Book fairs and book clubs dwindled away due to lack of interest and library lessons offered little more than opportunities for collective worship in the non-fiction section for boys or huddled gatherings of girls pretending to pour over an illustrated Shakespeare while they quietly discussed the latest gossip or read each other’s text messages.

The real crunch came a few years ago in the A Level classes, when students professing a desire to study English Literature at university claimed to hate reading.  When asked why they had chosen Literature, the answers varied from:  ‘Well I really enjoyed Pride and Prejudice.  I mean Keira Knightley was okay, but Matthew Macfadyen...’; to ‘I like Shakespeare.  Laurence Fishburne as Othello was really excellent.’

I harangued my students mercilessly every time they asked if there was a DVD of the text we were studying.  (In my defence, I’m not claiming that films have no place in the teaching of literature, just that they should provide the little ornament on the top of the tree, not constitute the whole of Christmas).  Students invariably said they found it so much easier to watch a film than read a book.

But as year upon year this antipathy towards reading – and in particular classical literature – grew and the internet made it (or so the students thought) so much easier to cheat on their essays, teaching literature became more about policing students than teaching them and sharing in their discoveries.  Today more and more children simply cannot be bothered to read.  Teachers don’t just have to worry about plagiarism anymore – there are numerous agencies all over the world employing people willing to write students’ assignments for a paltry sum.  And sadly these are beyond the refined searching tentacles of Google.  The system allows lazy students to avoid even glancing at the great literature they were meant to study.  And the chances are, if they don't do it now, they won't in the future.

Good teachers can inspire children in lessons, certainly, but much depends on students' willingness to go away and read, think and discover for themselves.  Nowadays, sadly, children are less and less inclined to make the time in their fast-paced lives to do just that.  If they can find a shortcut, they will take it.  I didn’t set out to moralise on the rights and wrongs of this (though doubtless my position is fairly clear), I just feel depressed that it is happening and worry about how sadly impoverished future generations will be. 

Maybe the media can compensate?  Personally, I must confess that I doubt it. 

 Posted on Yahoo this week:  

[I am 16 years old and so far i think I've read only 1 book lol. I think i will like books with mystery, science fiction. horror, fantasy, crime genre.I've been reading alot of manga .Its never too late to start .Bad english I hope you understand.]

Need I say more?