What Squished My Bookworm?
Plus, more Barbie discourse, how to make a Presbyterian, and one of the most beautiful classical compositions I’ve ever heard
When I was a little girl, reading was heaven. If I was lucky, I was able to hole up in my room from morning to night, plowing through my own personal library at a clip of two paperback novels a day. Box sets in particular thrilled me – I loved a collection, with their candy-colored spines and familiar characters that whisked me away to places beyond the confines of my iron-framed, lace-trimmed twin bed.
These stories were a formative force in my life. They were an introduction to the quirky rainbow of humanity and the geographic expanse of our planet. I’ve always been a particularly gregarious soul, so books gave me a passport to dimensions otherwise unavailable to me as a kid in the suburbs of the conservative South. Reading is magical – it can transport you to places and situations in ways that even film and television can’t touch, because reading creates a perfect marriage between the author’s ideas and how our imaginations uniquely render those ideas.
If it’s so magical, why did I stop?
I’m ashamed to admit that I no longer have that same voracious appetite for reading. The literary discipline of my younger years is virtually gone, which is particularly abhorrent because I am a writer. Everyone knows that to be a superb writer, you have to be a superb reader. Sadly, though, here’s the average life cycle of my literary inclinations: hear about a good book, order the good book, excitedly read first chapters of good book, highlight choice phrases in good book, get distracted by other good books, lament that I can’t get excited about any of these good book, sit distractedly on bed with iPhone in hand for hours of social media scrolling while being slowly boxed in by walls of mostly unread, partially highlighted good books, seek out totally new good books, repeat process forever.
So you see, my bookworm has been squished. That said, in my defense, I don’t feel like I’m in some sort of mental decline as a result. I still feel tuned into current affairs, I can still navigate diverse conversations among friends and strangers, I’m continuing to augment my vocabulary, and I’m writing more now than ever before. Book advocates would have you believe that this 20-year dry spell would have made me into a total dunce, but people who know me would (hopefully) say otherwise.
So how does one reconcile intellectual growth with unintentional book abandonment that I know is not unique to me? A.O. Scott’s essay in last week’s New York Times Book Review section boldly declared that we’re “in the throes of a reading crisis,” citing book bans, chatbots, and pedagogical warfare as key drivers. Some might debate the drivers, but the fact of the matter remains. Pew Research Center recently reported that roughly a quarter of American adults admitted to not having read a whole book in the prior year. But does that mean we’re in a crisis? I can’t speak for all of these people (I surely do not want to become the poster child for adult-onset illiteracy) but there is most definitely some sort of underrated version of reading happening in my life that is not only sustaining my standing as a well-adjusted, mentally-sound woman but actually growing my intellectual prowess.
Upon reflection, I determined that, in lieu of a steady diet of books, I am still technically reading:
The rooms I am in, both personal and professional
Long Twitter threads – ahem, ‘X’ threads – by smart and petty people with big opinions
About 12% of arts & entertainment articles in the Sunday Times
Wikipedia entries that I’m using to fact-check my adversaries in rousing debates
Countless essays, interviews, and Onion headlines DM’d to me by friends
Magazine and newspaper clippings on cultural topics hand-selected and delivered to me by my mother-in-law
Is this the exhaustive list? No, of course not. I’m also reading 200,000 emails a week, the nutrition labels on grocery items, my kids’ homework, the comments under YouTube videos and Instagram reels, and the occasional non-fiction memoir about people with lives so fabulous and prolific that no one would fault them for forgetting to read. This list makes me feel guilty, like I’m not spending my time on high-value activities. But when it comes to reading, what exactly qualifies as high value? What is the role and function of reading in post-academic circumstances? Can it be replicated in “new media” and other social forums where informal stories are told?
Scott’s “Reading Crisis” essay best characterizes the role of reading in modern society through the lens of Frederick Douglass, who famously wrote that “the pathway from slavery to freedom” ran through printed word, and “that education and slavery were incompatible with each other.” In essence, reading is key to liberation, to revolution, to agency and autonomy. Further, Scott asserts, reading “makes and unmakes our social and solitary selves.” (Note: I am now pulling some books from the bookshelf and putting them on my nightstand, lest I undo the makings of our collective selves.)
There’s also a major case to be made on the positive impacts of reading on the brain, which goes so far as to actually rewiring it to be more empathetic and more conducive to decision-making. Researchers found that reading fiction can lower one’s need for “cognitive closure,” effectively nurturing thoughtfulness, creativity, and increased comfort with competing narratives—all attributes of higher EQ.
Okay, so we’re all in agreement that books – or, more specifically the stories that books tell – should be widely embraced in a healthy, functioning society and should be a fundamental aspect of our personal mental hygiene. The issue here is rather how to make deliberate space for these stories in our lives when we’re no longer excitedly reaching for paperbacks the way we did when we were kids.
The good news is that science gives credence to the power of “non-traditional” storytelling to help supplement a seemingly weak literary diet. (And, if you think about the timeline of human history, the post-Gutenberg printed word is relatively new and hardly has the storytelling market cornered.) For example, research shows that the act of listening to a story can also light up your brain. When we're told a story, not only are language processing parts of our brain activated, experiential parts of our brain come alive, too. In reality, people spend most of their conversations telling personal stories and gossiping. A study by an anthropologist and evolutionary biologist at the University of Liverpool in England found that these social topics accounted for 65% of speaking time among people in public places, regardless of age or gender. Anthropologists note that storytelling could have also persisted in human culture because it promotes social cohesion among groups and serves as a valuable method to pass on knowledge to future generations.
Still, if you’re part of the quarter of American adults who haven’t finished a book in the past year and want to focus your energy on becoming a more consistent reader, the good news is it’s not too late to turn the tide. Carnegie Mellon conducted a six-month daily reading program aimed at instilling better reading habits in participants and found that the volume of white matter in an area of the brain that governs the use of language was increased as a result. This is not unlike findings from neuroscientists on the richer repository of white matter found in musicians who spend extensive time practicing their instruments throughout childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. The brain does fundamentally change in response to training.
Ultimately, though, it’s the stories themselves that make and unmake our social and solitary selves, not necessarily the channel or packaging that they’re delivered in. Being committed to a consistent reading regimen is a virtuous effort, but should not be mistaken as THE sole virtue among those of us seeking liberation and progress. Perhaps the better approach is committing to a healthy mix of story avenues – conversations over drinks with a diverse range of friends, lively banter with the family at the dinner table, scrolling through hot button discourse on social media, getting lost in a Netflix documentary, downloading an audiobook, eavesdropping on strangers at the bar, scanning The Skimm headlines in your Uber, listening to a podcast and yelling out your opinions even though no one in the episode can hear you.
The opportunity is really about tuning into the stories people tell and engaging in them constructively, whether it be Gladwell, Ginsberg, Gerwig, or Grandma.
Did you know that if you say, “gimme a Presbyterian,” it doesn’t necessarily mean “give me a person who is part of a specific reformed protestant tradition rooted in the Church of Scotland?” It can also mean a highball featuring whiskey topped with a half-n-half split of club soda and ginger ale. Also commonly tagged as a “Press” cocktail (e.g., Bourbon Press), this drink has a lot of variations and interpretations. Most folks use the basic equation of favorite liquor + soda + lemon/lime/ginger fizziness (for example, 7-Up). Here’s one way to go about it:
Add scotch into a highball or Collins glass over ice (check out last week’s review of Monkey Shoulder)
Top with equal amounts of ginger ale and soda.
It definitely feels like something one’s grandparents would sip while playing backgammon and chain smoking. A true classic!
Last week, I shared my lukewarm review of the Barbie movie. Turns out, I am somewhat of an outlier, at least in the Millennial / Gen X woman bracket. That’s okay, I live for the discourse. In fact, the discourse around Barbie has been more illuminating, thought-provoking, and energizing than the movie itself. So, for that reason, I’m putting more points on the Team Barbie board than I did a week ago.
If you’re not burned out on the Barbie convo, I highly recommend tuning into the latest episode of writer and comedian Chelsea Devantez’s podcast. The hot takes run across the spectrum, from loved it, hated it, and “I liked it but I was irked by some of it.” While technically not a “screen time” item, this covers something we watched on the screen, so it counts.
LISTEN: Glamorous Trash Talk: The Barbie Movie and How We Tell Female Stories
Although classical composer Edward Elgar isn’t really a household name in the way that Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven are, his work has certainly endured (his Pomp and Circumstance has played at virtually every graduation ceremony for the last 120 years). Biographers portray Elgar as a stiff-lipped Englishman who was forever plagued with insecurities both socially and professionally. Yet, much like other quiet, spiritually stormy, tough-nut-to-crack types, his art revealed him to be a deeply expressive man. In fact, Elgar composed one of my favorite “weepy” orchestral pieces. And I really, really like my classical music weepy. I like it weepy, soaring, romantic, epic, and heart-wrenching. This piece is all of these things and is one of the most beautiful compositions I’ve ever heard.
Nimrod from Enigma Variations
This is such a dynamic piece. In fact, it’s so dynamic that it can come off as uneven to the uptight listener – first you’ll want to turn up the volume because it starts off so softly, but then it ramps up so intensely that it’ll feel like it’s blowing out your speakers unless you turn it way back down again. Turning the volume up and down to get it “just right” is not the right approach here. The right approach is to find a place of solitude where you can really succumb to its moodiness. Don’t fidget with the volume nob, just let Elgar and his big emo mustache take you on a sexy rollercoaster of massive symphonic feelings.
Whether you listen to this on Spotify, Apple Music, whatever, be sure to look up the version conducted by Leonard Bernstein. That’s the very best version.