At the risk of sounding like a Chick-fil-A commercial saying, “Eat more chicken,” my message this week is much simpler:
Read more books.
A book, a magazine, and a newspaper all came together for me this week in a way that made this topic impossible to ignore.
I was finishing Powers and Thrones by Dan Jones and thinking about writing simply to recommend his books. If you enjoy history, his books are absolutely “must reads.” His ability to explain complex historical events while making the reader feel like he is reading an adventure novel is remarkable.
Then I read the cover story in the August issue of The Atlantic titled, “The End of Reading Is Here.” After that came an editorial in the Black River Falls Banner Journal discussing Wisconsin’s reading scores.
By the time I finished all three, one conclusion seemed unavoidable.
Reading is in trouble.
There are certainly bigger problems in the world than declining reading habits. Wars, economic uncertainty, political division—those deserve our attention. But I also believe that the decline of reading quietly fuels many of those other problems.
This is the battle I believe needs to be fought.
Anyone who travels by air has probably noticed what I have for years.
Sit in an airport terminal before boarding your flight and look around. Hundreds of people will be staring at phones, tablets, or laptops. Very few will be reading a book.
Board the airplane and the pattern continues. The moment people sit down, earbuds go in, movies begin, games start, or social media fills the screen. Only a handful of passengers ever pull out a book.
Now, maybe many of those people are reading quality articles or important work on their devices. I certainly hope so, but I can’t help looking up from my own book and feeling as though we are slowly drifting into one of Ray Bradbury’s or Kurt Vonnegut’s dystopian novels.
Does it really matter?
I believe it does.
The Banner Journal editorial pointed out that on the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress, only about 31% of Wisconsin fourth and eighth graders scored at or above proficiency in reading. Wisconsin has passed legislation designed to improve literacy, but implementation has struggled because schools lack adequate resources.
Those numbers should concern every one of us, but why would children become readers if adults rarely model reading themselves?
The article in The Atlantic paints an even darker picture. The decline isn’t just among children. Adults are reading fewer books, spending less time with long-form writing, and losing the ability—or perhaps the desire—to engage in deep reading.
Now, I know some of you are already smiling.
“Easy there, Chad.”
“I remember you as a kid.”
You’d be right.
I wasn’t much of a reader growing up. I was easily distracted, struggled to concentrate, and would have preferred almost anything else over sitting down with a book.
And my former students probably remember that there were days when I relied on videos in the classroom more than I should have.
I plead guilty to both charges.
But none of that changes what I’ve learned since then.
Somewhere along the way, largely because I grew up in a home where reading was valued, I developed the discipline to become a reader. Looking back, I also wish I had done more to cultivate that same discipline in my students.
Reading isn’t always entertainment. Sometimes it’s work. And that’s exactly the point.
If you want muscle endurance, you have to challenge those muscles through endurance training.
If you want a stronger mind, you must challenge it through deep reading.
Reading demands focus. It requires patience. It teaches us to follow complicated ideas, wrestle with opposing viewpoints, and think critically rather than react emotionally.
Our brains need that exercise every bit as much as our bodies do.
One of the fascinating themes Dan Jones explores in Powers and Thrones is the role literacy played in lifting Europe out of what we call the Dark Ages. The spread of books, learning, and education transformed civilization.
Ideas spread because people learned to read. Knowledge accumulated because people preserved it in books. Civilizations advanced because people took the time to think deeply.
Today, we live in an age where information has never been more available, yet thoughtful reading has never been more neglected.
Instead, too many of us are content to let computers—and increasingly artificial intelligence—do our thinking for us.
Ironically, the smartest people you hear on podcasts became intelligent the old-fashioned way.
They read.
If someone truly has wisdom worth sharing, chances are they earned it by spending hours and hours reading books, not scrolling headlines. So instead of only listening to what they have to say, read what they read.
At the risk of sounding preachy, I’ll leave you with one simple request.
Read.
Read fiction.
Read history and biographies.
Read science and social sciences.
Read books that entertain you.
Read books that challenge you.
Read books that force you to slow down and think.
Read for your own soul.
Read because your children and grandchildren are watching.
Read because our civilization depends on people who can think deeply, reason carefully, and understand ideas larger than themselves.
I promise you this.
The next book that truly reaches down into your soul won’t just be worth your time.
It will make you want to pick up another one.
That’s the perspective this week.
Oh, and by the way, thanks for reading it!
Until next Friday,
C. Tuescher
Lake Petenwell early in the week before the smoke and haze from the wildfires.
Lake Petenwell under the cloud of smoke from the wildfires.