Americans Reading Fewer Books Than in Past

Kulcha Vulcha as Saturday is the time to put our hands on pink newspaper the London Financial Times  it is peppered with insightful stories about life and death 

 In praise of Australian Aboriginal art – ‘the oldest surviving culture in the world’ 2022 is the year of First Nations art. It’s an acclaim that’s long overdue, say fans like Steve Martin

Here are some things scholars have recently tried to count. The estimated cost of the Covid-19 pandemic: $16 trillion in the United States alone. Premature deaths from air pollution: 10 million a yearworldwide, most caused by burning fossil fuels. The number of speaking characters in Jane Eyre:67.

Can life satisfaction be scored on a 1-to-10 scale? Is the value of a human life measurable in dollars? Our intellectual regime is overly reliant on numbers

       In The Observer they go about Introducing our 10 best debut novelists of 2022, which includes brief Q & As with each of the authors. 
       Some fun titbits along the way -- such as the author who says that W G.Sebald was: "very dry and droll, very likable but sort of Eeyore-ish".

At Tablet David Samuels has an extensive Q & A with Bernard-Henri Lévy, The Nomad. 

       The Millions has now published their Most Anticipated: The Great First Half 2022 Book Preview -- "nearly 200 books".
       Lots of good books here -- but quite a few of the titles I am looking forward to aren't found here -- beginning with The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk (I just got my copy ...); see also the publicity pages from Riverhead Books and Fitzcarraldo Editions, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk. 
       Just off the top of my head, among my other most-anticipated that didn't make this list are:

• M: Son of the Century by Antonio Scurati; see also the Harper publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.comor Amazon.co.uk 
  
  
• Time Shelter by Georgi Gospodinov; see also the Liveright publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk 
  
  
• Palace of Flies by Walter Kappacher; see the New Vessel Press publicity page, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

       Jeffrey M. Jones reports on the latest Gallup results, finding that Americans Reading Fewer Books Than in Past. 
       The decline is pretty bad, the average number of books read down to 12.6, from 15.6 in 2016. The number of Americans who don't read at all has remained roughly the same -- 17% in the most recent survey -- but those who do are reading less, with the biggest decline in those answering that they read 11 or more books in the past year. 
       And:

The decline is greater among subgroups that tended to be more avid readers, particularly college graduates but also women and older Americans. College graduates read an average of about six fewer books in 2021 than they did between 2002 and 2016, 14.6 versus 21.1.

       The sad conclusion is that: "Reading appears to be in decline as a favorite way for Americans to spend their free time", as: 

The new data on book reading reinforce that the popularity of reading is waning, with Americans reading an average of three fewer books last year than they did five years ago and had typically read for the past three decades.

 

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Take the plunge – seven things you need to wild swim this winter From lakes to lochs, here’s our selection of the best cold-water kit

Swimming is a rite of passage, a crossing of boundaries,” wrote the late English author, naturalist and documentarian Roger Deakin. “When you enter the water, something like metamorphosis happens. Leaving behind the land, you go through the looking-glass surface and enter a new world.” Documenting his watery journey through the British

 Isles, his seminal 1999 book Waterlog helped propel the wild swimming movement in the UK. Today, shelves in bookshops are devoted to the sport as a growing number of people flock to rivers, lakes, ponds and the sea, whatever the weather or season. According to Google Trends, wild swimming searches worldwide reached an all-time high in 2021, more than doubling from 2019. While we tend to romanticise the act of outdoor swimming and enthusiasts use cheery descriptions – invigorating, rejuvenating – to brace themselves for frigid temperatures, cold water immersion has long been considered beneficial to the mind and body; reducing stress, boosting the immune system and improving circulation. But it shouldn’t be too punishing. Whether you’re doing a quick dip or longer laps, here are a few little luxuries that will keep you warm and comfortable this winter.