Writing about reading

I am admittedly an elite snob in the reading business because I have been an English professor for more than 40 years. Of course, then, I am arrogantly amused at the National Endowment for the Arts chairman’s pride that the category “literary readers” now totals 112.8 million Americans. Whoopee! Literature is booming!

I suppose that all reading is of literacy value for those who don’t read easily; practice makes, well, better. But what of literary value? Your list of the top four novels at the Los Angeles Public Library are all Stephenie Meyer’s “dark romances” for adolescents (oops! “young adults”). Frankly, dears, we’re talking about the equivalent of TV cop shows and soaps for kids. I’d recommend instead watching episodes of “The Wire” and “Mad Men” for literary value, which is not just printed words about made-up stuff.

David Eggenschwiler

Los Angeles

--

As the study director of the NEA’s new report on reading, I want to clarify a point in David L. Ulin’s interpretation of our findings.

Ulin says, “In 2008, for the first time, the NEA included online reading habits in its survey.” Since 1982, the NEA and the U.S. Census Bureau have employed the same set of questions about the reading of novels, short stories, poetry and drama. The survey questions are not worded to exclude online reading.

Although the NEA/Census survey does ask new questions about online reading, the responses are not included to compute overall reading rates.

The point is that, for the first time in the survey’s 26-year history, reliable trend data show that literary reading taking place in any format has increased for virtually every demographic group.

Sunil Iyengar

Washington