Open Writing

Fifty years ago Aldous Huxley said, “Every man who knows how to read has it in his power to magnify himself, to multiply the ways in which he exists, to make his life full, significant and interesting.”

Not all men agree, judging by how much male reading levels lag behind the females, but that might be changing. A new National Endowments of the Arts study, “Reading on the Rise: A New Chapter in American Literacy,” has found that “a quarter-century of precipitous decline in fiction reading has reversed. While only a bit more than 50% of American adults admitted “reading some kind of so-called literary work … literary reading increased among virtually all age groups, ethnic and demographic categories since 2002.”

Moreover, the reading of novels, poetry and dramatic works “increased most dramatically among 18-to-24-year-olds, who had previously shown the most significant declines.”

Some bright, lively people say they can’t devote much time to reading, and therefore don’t bother with fiction. “If I want to read fiction,” as the saying goes, “I’ll pick up a newspaper.” But here’s Robert Louis Stevenson’s take on reading fiction: “The most influential books, and the truest in their influence, are works of fiction. They repeat, they re-arrange, they clarify the lessons of life; they disengage us from ourselves, they constrain us to the acquaintance of others; and they show us the web of experience, but with a singular change, that monstrous, consuming ego of ours being, nonce, struck out.”

By “nonce,” Stevenson meant “on this occasion,” or “for once.” Truly setting aside one’s ego, always a monumental task, can be facilitated by gifted writers. The library’s Guys Read program, which encourages 4th grade boys to read for fun, uses mostly fiction to excite boys about reading. It improves both their ability to absorb information and their chances at leading successful lives. A glance at the burgeoning U.S. male prison population, with 60% of the inmates functionally illiterate, proves it.

I’ve never seen a program get boys enthused about books and reading like Guys Read. Here’s how it works. During the month-long Guys Read program in January, teams of male volunteers read well-illustrated, “boy-friendly” books during the 4th graders lunch periods. While reading, they project the pages onto screens, using laser pointers to show their place. 4th grade was chosen because that’s when many boys stop seeing themselves as readers. Guys Read changes their minds, and even boys with low attention spans respond to this approach. Literally none of them miss a reading session, and copies of the Guys Read books given to the school libraries fly off the shelves.

Unfortunately, the program’s main sponsor, without whom Guys Read wouldn’t exist, can’t continue underwriting it. Nevertheless, a scaled-back Guys Read program will still be presented this winter to every 4th grade boy in the Fairbanks public school district. Future funding will be found somehow, for convincing boys that men like to read, and books can be fun, is too important to quit on.

This was driven home once again by reading Walter Isaacson’s “Einstein: His Life and Universe.” Many years ago I read “Einstein for Beginners” by Joseph Schwartz, and found it just as advertised on the cover: “Amusing, irreverent, sophisticated and highly accessible introduction to Einstein's life and thought.” The Washington Post reviewer added, "The presentation of [Einstein's] discoveries is little short of inspired.” The book’s impertinent tone and illustrations allowed my pea-brain to conceptualize relativity and want to learn more. Walter Isaacson, the award-winning historian, took care of that.

In Isaacson’s recent Einstein biography, he relates how 10-year-old Albert, a mathematical prodigy, was floundering academically until his parents invited Max Talmud, a young medical student, to eat with them on weekends. Talmud often brought books to Albert, including a popular illustrated set titled “People’s Books of Natural Science.” These picture-books profoundly affected young Einstein, who had a gift for “thinking in pictures.” Indeed, it was this gift that enabled him to visualize scenarios to illustrate and explain his difficult scientific concepts.

However, Einstein also enjoyed fiction, ranging from “Don Quixote” and other classics to the Yiddish humorist Jacob Adler, because, as Ralph Waldo Emerson observed, when it’s done right, “Fiction reveals truth that reality obscures.”