the pleasure of reading essay summary

Pleasure of Reading Essay

The human mind is rational and does not take things for guaranteed. Man is constantly trying to run after knowledge and answers to the various questions that arise in his mind. His areas of interest are wide and he remains inquisitive all his life.

To satisfy his thirst for knowledge and information he can always turn to books for help. It is important to be selective about the kind of books that one decided to read. If we read books that are trash, we are liable to be corrupted by them.

Reading substandard material is simply a waste of time. Education cannot be measured by degrees and qualifications. It is in fact measured by the culture and manners that one imbibes. A person can enrich himself with good qualities and a commendable culture if he comes across books that have a message to convey.

Good books sow the seeds of curiosity in man and he wishes to read more and more. He cannot acquire the desired knowledge by reading a single book. He must, therefore, read a number of them depending on his speed. Books that don’t sharpen our sensibility are rather futile to read.

Books also give pleasure to us. Apart from giving knowledge, they provide us with lasting pleasure. They mould our ideas, outlook and character and are like good and reliable friends. Man can never feel lonely if he has the company of good book.

Our friends may not have time for us at times, but a book can never desert us. We must select books of some particular purpose before we start reading. Sometimes we read aimlessly and once we finish the book we tend to develop a very negative attitude towards reading.

We may then lose interest in further reading. The habit of reading should be cultivated right from an early stage in life. Children must be encouraged by their parents and teachers to read novels, dramas, poetry, etc.

One can read even while travelling. It has often been said that “ an idle mind is a devil’s workshop” . In order to protect oneself from the devil, one can always resort to reading and thus find pleasure in one’s life.

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Short Essay on Pleasure of Reading [100, 200, 400 Words] With PDF

Being able to read is the ultimate gift for human beings from god. This is considered one of the most pleasurable habits. In this lesson today, you will learn how to write essays on the topic of ‘Pleasure of Reading’ that you may find relevant in your exam.

Feature image of Short Essay on Short Essay on Pleasure of Reading

Short Essay on Pleasure of Reading in 100 Words

Reading is the biggest pleasure in this world. Books are our best companions. So reading is the best thing we can do. We read many books. We also love to read magazines and newspapers. All of these give us pleasure. We enjoy a different world through reading. Reading our favourite books gives us immense joy.

Reading is the food for thought. We become intelligent when we read. If we are sad then reading a book helps us to become light. We read several things. Our parents and school encourage us to read storybooks. It expands our imagination and helps us to think better. So we must never give up the habit of reading. It should be the regular work of wise people.

Short Essay on Pleasure of Reading in 200 Words

We learn as we read. When we are young, we are taught to read by our parents. They teach us alphabets and numbers. We get many books that have pictures and colours on them. It makes us happy. From a little age, parents tell us to read books.

Reading is a wonderful habit. It stays with us forever. When we read, we feel joy. We get into a different world as we read. Reading helps us forget all the problems of our life. When we study in school, we read books for examinations. It teaches us a lot. But at home, we also read storybooks. It is our biggest pleasure.

We read several things like stories, comics, and magazines. Our teachers encourage us to read newspapers. Reading newspapers improves our speaking skills. It increases our knowledge of words. We get to know about much important news when we read the daily newspaper aloud. Some people read in their leisure. Some love to read when they are travelling somewhere.

We still enjoy reading a storybook when we are enjoying long distances. It kills our boredom. We do not get tired of time when we read, Our ability to speak develops as we read a different text. We learn new words. We also learn how to write better by reading. So reading books is a wonderful habit for all.

Short Essay on Pleasure of Reading in 400 Words

What separates a learned person from a stupid? The answer is simple. His ability to read. Reading makes us wise. It makes us different from others. If we cannot read, we will stay stupid forever. People will cheat us if we are not learned. So reading is a must for everyone. All of us should be able to read and understand. We go to school so that we can read, write and learn. Our parents are always encouraging us to read every day. Our teachers help us to read several books. So reading is a joy for all.

Reading is a pleasure for us. It is also a necessity. We eat food every day. We bathe daily. We sleep for eight hours. Similarly, we have to read daily. We start reading when we are in our kindergarten school. There we first learn alphabets and numbers.

Our parents and teachers teach us how to read the alphabet and how to write them. Slowly we grow up. Then we can read things on our own. We no longer need the help. As we read, it stays in our minds. In childhood, we read rhymes. We forever remember those rhymes. Reading makes us happy.

In schools, we are taught many things. Then we have to read many books. It helps in our examination. But we do not stop there. At home, we read storybooks. We read funny stories, fairy tales, detective stories, and also comics. All of these give us pleasure. Books are our best friends. So we like to spend time with them.

We enjoy reading books. As we read, we learn several things. We learn new words. Our teachers always tell us to read. We often read the newspaper. Reading the newspaper aloud helps us in our speaking skills. We learn how to write by reading daily. So reading anything helps us in different ways.

We must take care as to what we are reading. Today many books are available in the market that is not of good quality. It destroys our time and energy. We do not learn anything good from those books. So parents should be careful while giving a book to their children.

Some of us love reading while travelling long distances. It kills the boredom of the distance. We don’t feel the time when we read. We feel happy as we finish a book. Reading always takes us to a different world. We love the story every book tells us. Reading gives us pleasure and also information. So we should always develop the habit of reading daily.

All the essays have been written in very simple language for a better understanding of all kinds of students. If you still have any doubts regarding this lesson, kindly mention that in the comment. To read more essays on such important topics, keep browsing our website.

Join us on Telegram to get the latest updates on our upcoming sessions. Thank you. See you again, soon.

THE PLEASURE OF READING

43 writers on the discovery of reading and the books that inspired them.

edited by Antonia Fraser ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 20, 2015

Warm, often charming essays that celebrate the treasure of books.

Writers reveal the books that shaped them.

The mission of the British Give a Book charity is to share books with those most in need, including children in poor primary schools, mothers in shelters, and prisoners. This collection, whose royalties will aid the charity, is a slight expansion of a previous volume edited by Fraser ( Perilous Question: Reform or Revolution? Britain on the Brink, 1832 , 2013, etc.) in 1992 to celebrate the bicentenary of the British book chain WHSmith. The new collection includes 43 writers who were asked to reflect on their early reading and to list 10 favorite books. American readers will find many familiar notables among the original contributors, including Stephen Spender, Doris Lessing, John Fowles, Margaret Atwood, and A.S. Byatt. Younger writers are likely to be less familiar: the Indian-born novelist Kamila Shamsie; biographer Katie Waldegrave; poet Emily Berry; and playwright Tom Wells. On the whole, the essays make for pleasant reading. “My first sense of books,” writes Edna O’Brien, “is the feel and the smell of them...old books growing musty in a trunk.” The late playwright and novelist Simon Gray learned to read from “the captions and balloon-dialogue of Captain Marvel comics.” Germaine Greer calls reading her “first solitary vice…I read while I ate, I read in the loo, I read in the bath. When I was supposed to be sleeping, I was reading.” Lists of favorite books tend toward the canonical, with Jane Austen a popular entry, whether Mansfield Park (the favorite of mystery writer Ruth Rendell: “the fun-less one, the profoundest, the most didactic, but nevertheless the greatest”) or Pride and Prejudice . Dickens, Dostoevsky, Shakespeare, and Joyce reappear, as well. Tom Wells cites David Sedaris’ The Santaland Diaries and describes Joan Littlewood’s autobiography Joan’s Book “like a radiator, a suit of armour, and a proper adventure, all at once.”

Pub Date: Oct. 20, 2015

ISBN: 978-1-63286-228-0

Page Count: 368

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Review Posted Online: May 17, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015

GENERAL NONFICTION

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BOOK REVIEW

by Antonia Fraser

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

More by E.T.A. Hoffmann

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

Episodes from the life of lady mendl (elsie de wolfe).

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.

Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955

ISBN: 0670717797

Page Count: -

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955

More by Ludwig Bemelmans

developed by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno

by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno

by Ludwig Bemelmans

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The Pleasure in/of the Text: About the Joys and Perversities of Reading

School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures

Research output : Book/Report › Book

Abstract / Description of output

Publication series, keywords / materials (for non-textual outputs).

Pleasure of the Text
contemporary literature
Roland Barthes
comparative literature
critical theory
intermediality

Access to Document

10.3726/b16484

Fingerprint

Text Arts and Humanities 100%
Pleasure Arts and Humanities 100%
Reading Arts and Humanities 100%
Perversity Arts and Humanities 100%
Enjoyment Arts and Humanities 28%
Signs Arts and Humanities 28%
Shapes Arts and Humanities 14%
Words Arts and Humanities 14%

Research output

1 Other chapter contribution
1 Chapter (peer-reviewed)

Research output per year

Introduction

Research output : Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Other chapter contribution

Volume 100%

Taking signs for what they are: Roland Barthes, Chris Marker and the pleasure of ‘Texte Japon’

Research output : Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter (peer-reviewed) › peer-review

Pleasure 100%
marker's 33%
Reading 33%

T1 - The Pleasure in/of the Text

T2 - About the Joys and Perversities of Reading

A2 - Arribert-Narce, Fabien

A2 - Endo, Fuhito

A2 - Pawlikowska, Kamila

PY - 2021/9/24

Y1 - 2021/9/24

N2 - Reading is a peculiar kind of experience. Although its practice and theory have a very long tradition, the question of aesthetic pleasure is as perplexing as ever. Why do we read? What exactly thrills us in the text? One of the most prominent scholars having addressed these questions in the twentieth century is undeniably Roland Barthes, who distinguished between the «ordinary» pleasure of reading and bliss (jouissance), a delight so profound that it cannot be expressed in words. Taking his work as a central reference, and revisiting some of his seminal publications on the subject such as Empire of Signs (1970) and The Pleasure of the Text (1973), this collection of essays adopts a similar interdisciplinary approach to explore a broad range of themes and issues related to the notion of readerly enjoyment, between form and content, emotion and reason, escapist and knowledge-seeking responses to the text: how do literary and ideological pleasures intersect? In what ways do perversions, madness or even fatigue contribute to the pleasure of the text? How do writing and signs, sense and significance, but also image and text interact in the intermedial process of reading? How can paratexts – i.e. the margins of the text, including footnotes – and metatexts play a part in the reader’s enjoyment?

AB - Reading is a peculiar kind of experience. Although its practice and theory have a very long tradition, the question of aesthetic pleasure is as perplexing as ever. Why do we read? What exactly thrills us in the text? One of the most prominent scholars having addressed these questions in the twentieth century is undeniably Roland Barthes, who distinguished between the «ordinary» pleasure of reading and bliss (jouissance), a delight so profound that it cannot be expressed in words. Taking his work as a central reference, and revisiting some of his seminal publications on the subject such as Empire of Signs (1970) and The Pleasure of the Text (1973), this collection of essays adopts a similar interdisciplinary approach to explore a broad range of themes and issues related to the notion of readerly enjoyment, between form and content, emotion and reason, escapist and knowledge-seeking responses to the text: how do literary and ideological pleasures intersect? In what ways do perversions, madness or even fatigue contribute to the pleasure of the text? How do writing and signs, sense and significance, but also image and text interact in the intermedial process of reading? How can paratexts – i.e. the margins of the text, including footnotes – and metatexts play a part in the reader’s enjoyment?

KW - Pleasure of the Text

KW - reading

KW - contemporary literature

KW - Roland Barthes

KW - comparative literature

KW - critical theory

KW - intermediality

U2 - 10.3726/b16484

DO - 10.3726/b16484

SN - 9781789977004

T3 - European Connections: Studies in Comparative Literature, Intermediality and Aesthetics

BT - The Pleasure in/of the Text

PB - Peter Lang

CY - Oxford

Our Mission

The Benefits of Reading for Pleasure

Reading for fun has numerous lifelong benefits, and we have ideas for how you can promote this habit among your students.

A teacher and young student sit together and talk.

Why don’t students read? Most teachers have the goal of promoting students’ lifelong love of reading. But why? And what can teachers and parents and librarians do to promote pleasure reading?

In our book Reading Unbound , Michael Smith and I argue that promoting pleasure reading is a civil rights issue. Data from major longitudinal studies show that pleasure reading in youth is the most explanatory factor of both cognitive progress and social mobility over time (e.g., Sullivan & Brown, 2013 [PDF]; Guthrie, et al, 2001 ; and Kirsch, et al, 2002 [PDF]). Pleasure reading is a more powerful predictor than even parental socioeconomic status and educational attainment.

So if we want our students to actualize their full potential as human beings and their capacity to participate in a democracy, and if we want to overcome social inequalities, we must actively promote pleasure reading in our schools, classrooms, and homes.

The Pleasures of Reading

Pleasure reading can be defined as reading that is freely chosen or that readers freely and enthusiastically continue after it is assigned. Our students (like all other human beings!) do what they find pleasurable. You get good at what you practice, and then outgrow yourself by deliberately developing new related interests and capacities.

In our study, we found that reading pleasure has many forms, and that each form provides distinct benefits:

Play pleasure/immersive pleasure is when a reader is lost in a book. This is prerequisite to experiencing all the other pleasures; it develops the capacity to engage and immerse oneself, visualize meanings, relate to characters, and participate in making meaning.
Intellectual pleasure is when a reader engages in figuring out what things mean and how texts have been constructed to convey meanings and effects. Benefits include developing deep understanding, proactivity, resilience, and grit.
Social pleasure is when the reader relates to authors, characters, other readers, and oneself by exploring and staking one’s identity. This pleasure develops the capacity to experience the world from other perspectives; to learn from and appreciate others distant from us in time, space, and experience; and to relate to, reciprocate with, attend to, and help others different from ourselves.
Work pleasure is when the reader develops a tool for getting something functional done—this cultivates the transfer of these strategies and insights to life.
Inner work pleasure is when the reader imaginatively rehearses for her life and considers what kind of person she wants to be and how she can connect to something greater or strive to become something more. When our study participants engaged in this pleasure, they expressed and developed a growth mindset and a sense of personal and social possibility.

Taken together, these pleasures explain why pleasure reading promotes cognitive progress and social possibility, and even a kind of wisdom and wholeness, and, in a larger sense, the democratic project.

Promoting the Pleasures of Reading

We need to help less engaged readers experience these same pleasures. That is our study’s major takeaway: We must make all five pleasures central to our teaching. We need to name them, actively model them, and then assist students to experience them.

To promote play pleasure, use drama techniques like revolving role play, in-role writing, and hot seating of characters in order to reward all students for entering and living through story worlds and becoming or relating to characters in the way that highly engaged readers do.

To promote intellectual pleasure, frame units as inquiry, with essential questions. Read a book for the first time along with your students—figure it out along with them, modeling your fits and starts and problems through think-alouds and discussion. Or pair an assigned reading with self-selected reading from a list, or a free reading choice that pertains to the topic. Use student-generated questions for discussion and sharing. Use discussion structures like Socratic seminar that make it clear there is no teacherly agenda to fulfill as far as topics or insights to achieve.

A whiteboard list of the author’s recent reading

To promote social pleasure, be a fellow reader with students. Put a sign on your door: “Dr. Wilhelm is reading _____.” Read one of their favorite books. Foster peer discussion of reading and response in pairs, triads, small groups, literature circles, book clubs, etc. Do group projects with reading that are then shared and even archived. Have a free reading program and promote books through book talks, online reviews, etc.

To foster work pleasure, use inquiry contexts and work toward culminating projects, including service and social action projects.

To foster inner work pleasure, engage students in imaginative rehearsals for living, inquiry geared toward current and future action, or inquiry for service. Have students think as authors making choices and plan scenarios for characters in dilemmas or those trying to help the characters. Write to the future or to a future self.

Make no mistake, the next-generation standards worldwide require profound cognitive achievements. Meeting such standards and the demands of navigating modern life will require student effort and the honing of strategies over time. Promoting the power of pleasure reading is a proven path there.

Reading for Pleasure: A Review of Current Research

Open access
Published: 22 March 2024

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Ana Vogrinčič Čepič ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2352-4934 1 ,
Tiziana Mascia ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-3047-5002 2 &
Juli-Anna Aerila ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1109-8803 3

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The narrative review examines the current state of research on reading for pleasure and its relevance in education and personal development. By analysing 22 studies published over the past several years (2014–2022), the authors have sought to identify the key trends and areas of focus within this field. The selected articles have been coded and analysed, and the results have been used to, among others, examine the type of research on reading for pleasure, the subject areas covered, the research methods used, the variables analysed, and the target groups involved. A particular attention has been paid to possible conceptualisations of reading for pleasure and reading for pleasure pedagogy, to the type of reading and the texts reading for pleasure may predominantly be associated with, as well as to its social dimension and relationship to the digital literary environment. The literature review shows that the studies on reading for pleasure highlight the importance of personalisation in reading for pleasure pedagogy and acknowledge the role of the material and social dimension of reading. Further, there are signs of a broader definition of reading materials, like comics, also in the educational context. The findings of the present review indicate the gaps in the research of reading for pleasure and highlight the need for a more profound understanding of the title concept and its benefits, thus contributing to the development of its future research and promotion.

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Introduction

Broadly speaking, reading for pleasure refers to any kind of reading the reader gets pleasure from. It is not limited to any genre (there is no universally defined literature for pleasure that reading for pleasure would refer to) and is usually associated with non-obligatory reading of self-chosen texts and characterized by high level of reader’s engagement and enjoyable experience of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1991 ).

Two large-scale ongoing surveys, PISA (2000–2018) and PIRLS (2001–2016), routinely demonstrate that students who like reading are better and stronger readers, which means that reading motivation and the pleasure associated with reading are among the key conditions for high reading achievement and should therefore be properly addressed and acknowledged. Footnote 1 While a direct comparison on reading for pleasure between PISA and PIRLS data is not possible due to different response categories and target groups, the results of both of the surveys urge us to think about new ways of luring students into reading. Especially older students’ reading habits as presented in PISA are cause for concern. The parameters in the cycles that looked in detail at reading performance, that is, in 2000, 2009 and 2018, show that in the majority of countries the number of students reading for enjoyment is decreasing. In all countries and economies, girls reported much greater enjoyment of reading than boys, and the fact that girls on average in every assessment clearly outperform boys in reading, suggests there is indeed a strong association between reading achievement and enjoyment of reading, as confirmed not only by PISA and PIRLS but also by many other researches (Guthrie et al., 2010 ; Mol & Jolles, 2014 ; Nurmi et al., 2003 ; Petscher, 2009 ).

What’s more, enjoying reading seems to be the decisive indicator of successful reading performance and academic attainment in general. Students who enjoy reading, and make it a regular part of their lives, are able to improve their reading skills through practice. Better readers tend to read more because they are more motivated to read, which, in turn, leads to improved vocabulary and comprehension skills ( PISA 2018 Results , vol. II. ch. 8, OECD, 2020 ). In fact, gaps in reading scores attributable to different levels of reading engagement (of which enjoyment is a key component) are far greater than the reading performances gaps attributable to gender. In other words: reading engagement is an important factor that distinguishes between high-performing and low-performing students, regardless of their gender. Boys who are more engaged in reading tend to outperform female students who are less engaged in reading ( Literacy Skills for the World of Tomorrow , OECD/UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2003 ). Footnote 2

This article presents a narrative literature review based on recent academic articles on the topic of reading for pleasure. The study systematically reviews peer-reviewed articles published between 2014 and 2022 with the aim of investigating how reading for pleasure figures in academic articles and identifying the most current themes of the research on reading for pleasure as well as the areas that still need to be researched. One of the focuses of the study is the idea of reading for pleasure pedagogy and it aims to highlight the ways in which reading for pleasure could be implemented in educational environment and in practice, since this is where policymakers could have a positive influence.

In the section “ The Concept of Reading for Pleasure ” we first try to present the title phenomenon and its related notions by drawing on the many existent definitions, taken from mainly older (book) studies (not articles) that were not included in the review, with the intention to see how the 22 articles under examination relate, differ or elaborate on the existing idea of reading for pleasure.

After explaining the methodology of our review and the data analysis procedure, we present the results divided in several topics.

The initial general research questions of the study were: What kind of peer-reviewed articles have been published on reading for pleasure between 2014 and 2022? How is reading for pleasure understood in peer-reviewed articles between 2014 and 2022? And, what is the relationship between reading for pleasure and pedagogy in peer-reviewed articles? These were our broad issues of interest, that guided us through the review, which provided us with some more or less specific answers.

The Concept of Reading for Pleasure

Literature on reading for pleasure uses a variety of definitions and interpretations of the concept as well as different denominations. Often, reading for pleasure is used interchangeably with ‘reading for enjoyment’ (Clark & Rumbold, 2006 ), ‘leisure reading’ (Greaney, 1980 ), ‘free voluntary reading’ (Krashen, 2004 ), ‘independent reading’ (Cullinan, 2000 ), or ‘recreational’ (Manzo & Manzo, 1995 ; Ross et al., 2018 ) and ‘self-selected reading’ (Martin, 2003 ), but also ‘engaged’ (Garces-Bascal et al., 2018 ; Paris & McNaughton, 2010 ), even ‘aesthetic’ (Jennifer & Ponniah, 2015 ) and ‘ludic reading’ (Nell, 1988 ). It is variably described as: “reading that we do of our own free will, anticipating the satisfaction we will derive from the act of reading” (Clark & Rumbold, 2006 , p. 6), “a purposeful volitional act with a large measure of choice and free will” (Powell, 2014 , p. 129), and “non goal-oriented transactions with texts as a way to spend time and for entertainment” (The Reading Agency, 2015 , p. 6).

In contrast, reading for academic purposes typically involves texts that are assigned as part of a curriculum, and then evaluated or tested on. It has a more structured and goal-oriented focus, whereas reading for pleasure tends to be open-ended and driven by the reader’s own interests and preferences (Wilhelm & Smith, 2014 ). It typically involves materials that reflect our own choice, at a time and place that suit us. Instrumental views on reading do not necessarily preclude pleasure as one can certainly experience pleasure when reading assigned literature, and many situations fall in-between work and leisure, but the primary context for reading for pleasure is undoubtedly linked to a relaxed and obligation-free atmosphere.

For struggling and/or reluctant readers, reading for pleasure is harder to experience when reading individually and is almost an achievement in itself. There is a proven correlation between skill and enjoyment which is why good readers tend to enjoy reading much more: If the student does not read fluently, it means that the effort and energy the student has to put into reading is greater than the pleasure (s)he gets from reading. Therefore, (s)he prefers to avoid reading, if possible. Consequently, bad readers become worse, and vice versa (see Stanovich, 1986 for Matthew effect, and also Möller & Schiefele, 2004 ). It is thus important that the chosen texts (their content, composition, stylistic features and their level of complexity) match the reader’s reading ability, level of pre-existing knowledge and reader’s interests (Sherry, 2004 ). All this plays a vital role in ensuring reading motivation, another concept reading for pleasure is closely connected to.

Reading motivation is a complex notion, which is usually divided into intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation to read comes from personal interest or enjoyment of reading and is related to positive experiences with reading itself. Studies have shown that intrinsic incentives, such as personal interest in the material, curiosity, involvement in the text, and a preference for challenge (e.g., McGeown et al., 2012 ) are better predictors of reading frequency and comprehension than extrinsic incentives, such as rewards or grades, parental pressure etc. (Becker et al., 2010 ; Lau, 2009 ; Schaffner et al., 2013 ; Schiefele et al., 2012 ; Wang & Guthrie, 2004 ). Even so, extrinsic motivation can gradually change into intrinsic (see also the notion of emergent motivation, Csikszentmihalyi et al., 2005 ). Intrinsic motivation refers to being motivated and curious to perform an activity for its own sake. It is the prototype of fully autonomous or self-determined behaviour and therefore represents the most optimal form of motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2000 ). In the case of reading, this means that children read because they enjoy it and become fully engaged in reading. Many studies report that intrinsic reading motivation generally declines over the school years (Kirby et al., 2011 ; McKenna et al., 1995 ; Wigfield et al., 2015 ), while further findings suggest that extrinsic motivation decreases over time as well (Paris & McNaughton, 2010 ; Schiefele et al., 2012 ).

In an educational system, where there is a focus on reading for assessment purposes, offering students opportunities for reading for pleasure can help them develop a lifelong love of reading. By showing them that reading can be enjoyable and introducing them to different reading materials and reading-related activities, everyone can find something to their liking (Collins et al., 2022 ; Merga, 2016 ). For conquering reading for pleasure, it is equally crucial to master the skills of reading as to reach the state of fully engaging and immersive reading, that is, feel a sustained impulse to read characterized by intense curiosity and a search for understanding (Baker & Wigfield, 1999 ; Wang et al., 2020 ). It is much easier to achieve it if one is a ‘good-enough’ reader.

Several studies have by now clearly demonstrated that the benefits of reading for pleasure far surpass the direct literacy-related aspects. Apart from improved reading comprehension, critical thinking skills and increased vocabulary, reading for pleasure can provide cognitive benefits, encourage social interactions, as people often discuss and share their reading experiences with others (Boyask et al., 2021 , 2023 ), improve emotional and psychological well-being (Mak & Fancourt, 2020a ), healthy behaviours (ibid., 2020b ) and a sense of personal enjoyment (Department for Education, 2012 ; The Reading Agency, 2015 ). Reading for pleasure is seen as a crucial foundation for lifelong learning and social and cultural participation, and can contribute to improved relationships with others, as well as to a better understanding of personal identity (The Reading Agency, 2015 ).

After providing this basic outline of reading for pleasure we will now present our review strategy.

Methodology

This study utilizes a narrative literature review, an approach suited for examining topics that have been studied from various perspectives across different research fields. A narrative literature review provides a thorough examination of a subject, facilitating the development of theoretical frameworks or laying the groundwork for further research (Snyder, 2019 ). This methodology is effective in mapping out a research area, summarizing existing knowledge, and identifying future research directions. Additionally, it can offer a historical perspective or timeline of a topic.

To conduct this review, the authors undertook a series of methodical steps: initially, they established a focus for their research before refining their research question as necessary. Subsequent steps involved identifying key search terms and establishing inclusion and exclusion criteria for the literature search. Upon retrieving relevant literature, the quality and pertinence of the identified studies were rigorously assessed. The data from these studies was then synthesized. Finally, in alignment with the procedures and findings the authors critically reviewed and presented the accumulated evidence, ensuring a comprehensive understanding of the research topic.

Data and Data Collection

The material for this research was gathered through a two-phase process. In the first phase, an extensive search based on the key words ‘reading’ and ‘pleasure’ was conducted using the search machine Volter which implements searches of the 502 databases of the University of Turku. The search returned articles from the following databases: EBSCOhost Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost Education, EBSCOhost SocINDEX, Taylor and Francis Social Science and Humanities with Science and Technology, SAGE Journals Premier 2022, Elsevier ScienceDirect Journals Complete, JSTOR Arts and Sciences II and III, Literature Online (LION), ProQuest Central and Cambridge Journals Current Subscription Content. However, the key words returned articles outside our focus area (in total 1473 hits) regarding the content and the field of sciences. Therefore, we decided to limit the search and tested several key word combinations: (1) education, reading for pleasure pedagogy, (2) reading for pleasure pedagogy and children, (3) reading, pleasure, motivation and (4) reading, pleasure and children. As these searches returned almost the same articles and did not limit the data enough (all the searches with more than 1000 hits), we decided to stay with the original search code “reading” AND “pleasure” but limit the data with following limitations: the field of science (excluding medical studies and natural science), the type of the publication (articles in academic journals), and open access. The publication year was restricted to articles published between 2014 and 2022, and only peer-reviewed articles written in English were included. The search resulted in 101 articles (originally 143 but as the duplicates were removed 101 remained) on a variety of topics, including foreign language learning and literary criticism. These articles were saved in a secure Google Drive folder and were only accessible to the researchers using a specific keyword.

During the second phase of the research process, all three researchers carefully read through the articles obtained in the first search and excluded those that only marginally dealt with reading for pleasure. Among others, we eliminated review articles and those that mainly belonged to the field of literary studies. Any duplicate versions were also removed. At last, we investigated the articles of the previous searches, and decided to add three of them to our final list. The second phase thus ended up with 22 articles which formed the data of this study. The list of the articles included in the review is presented in Table 1 together with the name of the journal, the author(s) and the title of the article.

Data Analysis

After defining the data, the data-analysis began. The data was analysed according to multi-phased, regulated and controlled coding (see Thorne, 2008 ), using mainly qualitative analysis supported with quantifications. The preliminary analysis started with reading the articles individually multiple times to acquire an overall picture of the content and to identify the categories on the basis of which we would then code the articles. This phase was mainly data-driven, but theory-driven analysis was used to support the researchers in defining the coding categories.

Apart from the basic information on each article, which included the title and the author(s), the name of the journal and publication year, we also took note of authors’ institutional and national affiliations. We then defined 12 categories for coding the articles, which are: the type of the article (theoretical and/or research); the target group of the study (according to age, type of readers and profession, if applicable); the methodology that was used (qualitative and/or quantitative); whether and how reading for pleasure was defined in the article, whether the article addressed reading for pleasure in an educational-context or not; whether reading for pleasure was understood as a means for better (school-related) achievement or rather in connection with other benefits; the focus of the article; whether the article was based on traditional view of reading (i.e., printed books only) or not; whether there was any consideration of the digital dimension; did the article talk about reading for pleasure pedagogy; did it consider the social aspects of reading; and did it define the meaning of pleasure itself. When possible, we also marked whether certain aspects (such as, e.g., traditional understanding of reading) were explicit or just implied. Finally, each article was equipped with a short summary of the content. This helped us to better grasp how reading for pleasure is understood and contextualized.

Each researcher independently analysed the 22 articles according to the above categories, and the results were then compared and discussed within the group. In most categories, the researchers reached a consensus, only in some instances there were slight differences in how individual categorisation was interpreted or described (as in question when a definition of a certain concept is explicit or implied). These discrepancies were addressed and resolved through discussion. On the basis of the above-described article categorisation the articles were coded to allow for quantification of the data.

The analysis took a two-folded approach, incorporating both qualitative and quantitative methods. In the qualitative analysis, the researchers carefully read through the analysis of the articles and identified the prevalent categories and themes. The goal was to gain a descriptive understanding of the current research on reading for pleasure. Coded categories were then used in the quantitative analysis yielding a basic overview on the prevailing topics, approaches and aims of the articles included. Both analyses were first carried out independently by each individual researcher and then confirmed by all. The results of the qualitative and quantitative analyses are presented separately and then synthesised in the conclusion.

As already implied, the reliability of the analysis was supported by researcher triangulation, meaning that several researchers study the same phenomena, using the same methods, techniques and theoretical framework of departure. If the researchers come to the same conclusions, the research process can be considered valid.

Publication Year, Represented Disciplines, National Affiliations

The results of the literature review show that the journals the articles were published in belong to various fields of knowledge: educational sciences, literacy, reading and language research, as well as library and information science and psychology. Half of the articles (n = 11) were published in journals concentrating on education and school context, and one third of them (n = 7) in journals on literacy, reading and language research, including also the research on second and foreign language learning. The rest of the disciplines mentioned above are represented by two journals each. In three cases, the same journal contributed two articles to our literary review data; these journals were Literacy , Cambridge Journal of Education and Reading in a Foreign Language . All the other journals in our selection are represented by one article each, which suggests that the topic of reading for pleasure is quite evenly handled in various disciplines.

The analysis shows that the articles on reading for pleasure were published relatively evenly throughout the years 2014 and 2022. However, over half of the articles were published after 2017 which might indicate a growing interest in the topic (Table 2 ).

Then again, if we take into consideration the advance online publication date (DOI number links), the numbers change (most notably for the year 2020), and the increase after 2017 seems less noticeable (Table 3 ).

According to the analysis, reading for pleasure is being researched on almost all the continents—Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe and North America. About one third of the articles derives from Europe, with United Kingdom having the highest number of published articles on the topic (n = 5). These are articles written by Burnett and Merchant ( 2018 ), Kucirkova and Cremin ( 2018 ), Kucirkova et al. ( 2017 ), Reedy and De Carvalho ( 2021 ), Sullivan and Brown ( 2015 ). Almost all the authors come from academic institutions, such as institutes and universities. However, there is also one primary school teacher (Reedy in Reedy & De Carvalho, 2021 ), a high school professor (Arai, 2022 ) and a librarian (Shabi in Abimbola et al., 2021 ). The origin countries of authors’ institutions are presented in more detail in Table 4 .

Even though the articles of our data come from several continents and have publication forums of different disciplines, they seem to concentrate on similar themes and have in most cases practical aims. The most common topics were the benefits and effects of reading for pleasure, the perceptions and attitudes of children/students on reading for pleasure, and the relation of reading for pleasure to digital reading. The articles apparently aimed at understanding the nature and meaning of reading for pleasure. The requirement for a broader definition of reading was pronounced as well as a role of pedagogy in ensuring reading for pleasure.

Type of the Articles, Research Methods and Target Group Contexts

Most of the articles in the data are traditional research articles (n = 15). One third of the articles (n = 7) have a more theoretical focus and may reference previous interventions or other empirical data sources. The methods used in the research vary: nearly half of the studies (n = 10) use qualitative methods, about one third (n = 6) use quantitative methods, and a few (n = 4) combine qualitative and quantitative methods. Two of the articles do not employ any methodology.

The target groups of the studies presented in the articles vary from minors to adults. Nevertheless, it appears that reading for pleasure research focuses mainly on children and the young, as half of the articles investigate this target group, and one fifth (n = 4) deal with both minors and adults. This means that only one third of the articles (n = 7) discuss reading for pleasure in relation to non-minor population: two of them specifically address librarians and library professionals (Merga and Ferguson, 2021 ; Ramírez-Leyva, 2016 ), while the other five are about university students. Some of the studies used existing data sets or data originally collected for other purposes (e.g., Sullivan & Brown, 2015 ). The size of the data varies depending on the characteristics of the data, ranging from under twenty to thousands of participants.

There is a wide range in the age of the groups studied, with some studies focusing on specific age groups, such as children or teenagers (e.g., Retali et al., 2018 ; Wilhelm, 2016 ), while others include a more diversely aged population (e.g., Kavi et al., 2015 ; Kucirkova et al., 2017 ). In most cases, the data concerned participants that were over 15 years old: secondary or high school students and second language learners at a university. Accordingly, a wide majority of articles (n = 15) relate to the educational context: primary and secondary schools and universities.

The analysis shows that very few studies identified reading groups according to their reading attitudes. One of the studies explicitly concentrated on investigating good readers (Thissen et al., 2021 ), and another (Wilhelm, 2016 ) focused on readers who were marginalised in a sense that they did not read the materials approved or used in school. It is somewhat surprising that weak or reluctant readers were not targeted as an object of study, as the articles seem to concentrate on using good or average readers as models for reading for pleasure. The only article that calls for pedagogy as well as for materials adjusted for the diverse readers (Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ) does not refer to any specific target group. Other than that, the only target group with challenges in reading were the second language readers (e.g., Arai, 2022 ; Ro & Chen, 2014 ).

Understanding of Reading, the Digital Dimension and the Social Aspect of Reading

Over half of the articles (n = 13) define reading in a sense that exceeds the traditional idea of reading the verbal printed books. They talk about ‘multimodal approaches to reading’ (e.g., Kavi et al., 2015 ; Ramírez-Leyva, 2016 ; Vanden Dool & Simpson, 2021 ), and ‘wide reading’ (McKnight, 2018 ), and use a more inclusive repertoire of genres, not habitually read in schools, such as comics, graphic novels and song lyrics (Reedy & De Carvalho, 2021 ; Retali et al., 2018 ; Wilhelm, 2016 ), as well as various (literary and non-literary) digital formats, which blur the lines between texts and films, text and games, and text and music, thus offering the reader more choice and potentially a more personal and pleasurable reading experience (Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ). Except for underlining the importance of self-chosen nature of the texts, most articles do not limit the type of literature appropriate for reading for pleasure. However, there is a noticeable albeit implied emphasis on narrative and fiction, that is, texts which tell stories of lived experience (Barkhuizen & Wette, 2008 in Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ).

The digital dimension is mentioned in half of the articles (n = 11), mostly when referring to reading material. One research examines the interaction the readers experience with media texts (Burnett & Merchant, 2018 ), another deals with how gamified reading might improve the reading interests and feelings of pleasure (Li & Wah Chu, 2021 ), Chireac et al. ( 2022 ) investigate the effects of creating videos on reading for pleasure, and Kucirkova and Cremin ( 2018 ) emphasise how the digital libraries, applications and digital storybooks allow for a more personalised reading experience.

The social aspect of reading in terms of its collective and shared experience is addressed in half of all the reviewed articles (n = 11), mainly published after 2018. This can partly be attributed to the digitalisation of the reading experience they refer to, which has a more pronounced social dimension. However, reading aloud, collective reading and discussion with others on what was read may all form part of pleasure experience with the printed text as well. According to Kucirkova et al. ( 2017 ), reading for pleasure is a social practice in a sense that the reader’s pleasure from engaging with a narrative is increased through the possibility of sharing this experience with others. With digital books, this engagement can be even expanded and intensified as readers can share their insights with others both remotely and/or immediately. Kucirkova and Cremin ( 2018 ) consider participation, defined as shared and sustained reading for pleasure engagement, as one of the six facets of children’s reading for pleasure engagement, which are particularly brought to the fore by digital books (together with affective, creative, interactive, shared and sustained engagement).

Despite being referred to in half of the articles, the social dimension in reading is more thoroughly examined only in a few of them: see McKnight ( 2018 ) for ‘new and participatory media forms’; Mahasneh et al. ( 2021 ) for ‘community-based reading intervention’, Kucirkova and Cremin ( 2018 ) for ‘community-oriented interactive space’, and Burnett and Merchant ( 2018 ) for ‘affective encounters’.

The Meaning of Reading for Pleasure

More than half of the articles (n = 14) include definitions of reading for pleasure, while eight of them do not. In four cases reading for pleasure is explained only via synonyms (Ghalebandi & Noorhidawati, 2019 ; Li & Wah Chu, 2021 ; Ro & Chen, 2014 ; Sullivan & Brown, 2015 ), which we did not count as a definition, in the other four articles, that do not define reading for pleasure, its meaning is either implied (e.g., as in contrast to reading from textbooks in Willard & Buddie, 2019 ), or the term is used without further explanation (Sénéchal et al., 2018 ; Willard & Buddie, 2019 ). The concept is addressed evenly in research and theoretical articles.

The articles can be divided in two groups according to the level on which they try to grasp the notion of reading for pleasure. The first can be labelled as descriptive, loose and instrumental, and as such closer to the already discussed Clark and Rumbold’s broad understanding of reading for pleasure ( 2006 ), emphasizing free choice and free will, experience of engagement, availability of various materials, and the context of leisure, entertainment and engagement. There are seven articles that can be categorized as such (among others: Mahasneh et al., 2021 ; Merga & Ferguson, 2021 ; Vanden Dool & Simpson, 2021 ). The other seven articles employ a more analytical approach, taking the above outlined idea of reading for pleasure as a basis, but opening it up to a more complex scrutiny, trying to detect different types of reading for pleasure, as well as various dimensions of pleasure and components of the reading experience that may affect it (e.g., Arai, 2022 ; Thissen et al., 2021 ; Wilhelm, 2016 ). The potential of environmental and material aspects of pleasure-reading is addressed, especially in relation to the digitization (Burnett & Merchant, 2018 ; Chireac et al., 2022 ; Reedy & De Carvalho, 2021 ). Rather than settling for one monolithic idea of reading for pleasure, these authors talk about the personalized pleasure-reading experience and emphasize the role of children’s agency and choice (Arai, 2022 ; Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ; Reedy & De Carvalho, 2021 ; Wilhelm, 2016 ).

Three of the reviewed articles offer a comparatively more in-depth approach to reading for pleasure. Thissen et al. ( 2021 ) discuss how different experiential dimensions of fiction reading—a sense of presence, identification, feeling of suspense and cognitive involvement—relate to pleasure, and suggest that flow is what integrates them all together, making it the strongest predictor for reading pleasure. “Flow is not only a key predictor of the pleasures of reading narratives but also modulates other important dimensions of the fiction reading experience, such as a sense of being present in the story world, identification with protagonists, feelings of suspense, cognitive involvement with the story, and text comprehension” ( 2021 , p. 710). Similarly, Arai ( 2022 ) defines pleasure as flow experience and relates it to the perceived book difficulty. Burnett and Merchant ( 2018 ) discuss the notion of the affect and enchantment in reading for pleasure in the context of digital reading and everyday literacy. They present reading as inextricably entangled not just with the text but also with other people, places and things, and describe the enchantment as an affect generated in the relations between these various elements. Their examples show the complex and diverse ways in which reading and pleasure are entwined, and that can range from immersive to ephemeral, individual to collective, and encompass anything from momentary hilarity to deep engagement.

All these (7) articles that delve deeper into the understanding of contemporary reading for pleasure tend to apply it to new media. The new media affect the nature of pleasure, especially when it comes to the young, which is why methods of reading motivation have to be adjusted to digital media environments. Being new and relevant they are more likely to engender feelings of pleasure in young people. Chireac et al. ( 2022 ) for example suggest creating videos (in which readers explain why they have chosen to read a certain book) as a support reading-related activity in order to boost pleasure and enhance reading comprehension.

Another aspect that characterizes the more in-depth discussions on reading for pleasure in the reviewed articles is the pronounced attention on the reader and on the pursuit of a personalized version of pleasure reading. Reedy and De Carvalho ( 2021 ) state that children’s agency must be fostered in order to create a pathway towards reading for pleasure; they present a number of case-study examples illustrating this practice with a special emphasis on the children’s co-creation of the reading setting. Kucirkova and Cremin ( 2018 ) talk about fostering reading for pleasure with personalized library managements systems, which can recommend book titles through algorithmic analysis of available titles and users’ past engagement with texts. They see huge potential in both—personalized books (print and digital) and in personalized response to text. Wilhelm ( 2016 ) also focuses on the perspective of the reader and analyses where s/he gets the pleasure from when reading voluntarily. In responses of avid adolescent readers, he detects five distinct types of pleasure: the immersive pleasure of play, intellectual pleasure, social pleasure, the pleasure of functional work, and the pleasure of inner work, underlining the pleasure of play, that is, the pleasure of living through a story, as the most important one.

These analytical articles reveal that reading for pleasure is a complex concept that should be explored in depth, in order for its various layers to be understood and translated into practically useful pedagogical approaches in the contemporary contexts.

The Need for Reading for Pleasure Pedagogy

Reading for pleasure pedagogy is addressed in nine out of 22 articles. It is usually not specifically defined and mainly refers to different practices and approaches of implementing reading for pleasure in the school curricula. The concept is more or less equally present in research as well as in more theoretically inclined articles. While the majority of research and intervention-based articles in our review describe various tools and techniques on how to incite reading for pleasure in the educational context, there are also a few that offer a more in-depth insight on the topic and build up on professional knowledge, developing a specific type of pedagogy, that is, reading for pleasure pedagogy (Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ; McKnight, 2018 ; Vanden Dool & Simpson, 2021 ; Wilhelm, 2016 ).

A common finding of the articles regarding reading for pleasure in general and reading for pleasure pedagogy in particular is that more opportunities should be afforded to include reading for pleasure in the school curricula (e.g., McKnight, 2018 ; Reedy & de Carvalho, 2021 ), or—as Wilhelm puts it: “the power and potential of pleasure suffers from a degree of neglect in schools, teaching practices and in research base” ( 2016 , p. 31). If nothing else, students should be able to choose the texts themselves or at least have more frequent possibilities to do so. Next, there is an evident consensus that too much focus is placed on reading as a technical and functional skill, framing it as a measurable result rather than a lived experience and process. In contrast to reading competence, reading for pleasure is not assessed and is frequently side-lined by high-profile focus on reading instruction, decoding and comprehension. This is reflected in the fact that more articles (n = 10) view reading for pleasure primarily as a means to achieve better literacy and literacy-related benefits, rather than as a goal that brings other, unmeasurable positive outcomes (n = 7). Four articles refer to both sides, and one article refers to neither option. Even so, the authors generally agree there should be a balance between the ‘skill to read and the will to read’.

Another common thread of discussion regarding reading for pleasure pedagogy is a call for working on a better understanding of pleasure and on what brings pleasure in the context of reading, since this is a base for a successful transaction between the reader and the text. In order to achieve this, several components should be acknowledged: a broad understanding of reading; personalized approach, adapted to the individual reader; attention to contextual elements (the setting, time and place of reading, atmosphere), and social dimension, that is, potential for interaction. An effective reading for pleasure pedagogy should therefore take into account new and participatory media forms, that would correspond to twenty-first century reading practices, and acknowledge a reader’s individualized interest (reflections, attitudes and lived experience) and his/her own perception of pleasure. It should involve an active role of the teacher as a reader and create an authentic teacher–child dialogue (Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ; McKnight, 2018 ). However, in practice, curriculum constraints and time limitations very much impede the effective reading for pleasure pedagogy, making it heavily dependent on individual teacher’s endeavours and beliefs (Chireac et al., 2022 ; Vanden Dool & Simpson, 2021 ), rather than on explicit knowledge of a reading for pleasure pedagogical framework, which is why a greater professional understanding of reading for pleasure pedagogy should be ensured.

Apart from confirming the reputation of reading for pleasure as “a fuzzy concept” (Burnett & Merchant, 2018 , p. 62), being loosely rather than exactly defined, this study also shows the concept has been expanding to include a wider range of reading materials, such as e-books and comics (e.g., Kavi et al., 2015 ; Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ; McKnight, 2018 ; Ramírez-Leyva, 2016 ; Retali et al., 2018 ; Reedy & De Carvalho, 2021 ; Vanden Dool & Simpson, 2021 ; Wilhelm, 2016 ). As more children are exposed to digital media, it is important to understand how these materials can be used to motivate children to read and encourage a love of reading (Kucirkova & Cremin, 2020 ). Studies also highlight reading in a second language, traditionally observed merely as a language learning activity, as a possible pathway towards reading for pleasure.

The loose definition of reading for pleasure makes it difficult to compare and fully understand the results of different studies. It is important to gain further knowledge on the nature of pleasure and on where the pleasure may come from, in order to be able to evoke it in the context of reading and develop effective reading for pleasure approaches. As observed, some of the examined articles address these very issues and try to detect the different components or criteria contributing to pleasure reading. The two most underlined notions in this regard refer to the importance of personalisation and to the acknowledgment of material and social dimension of reading. As already implied, by personalisation we think of approaches that encourage reading by taking in consideration the specifics of an individual reader, his or her interests, needs, wishes and choices. This does not exclude the foregrounding of the social dimension of reading as the latter is exactly what many readers need, and besides, personalized approach often results in grouping readers with similar agenda, which in itself could incite motivation.

The experience of pleasure may vary with individuals, and it is important to study and try to understand where the pleasure for different individuals comes from and then try to link it to reading. The personalised reading approach addresses intrinsic motivation and may as such also help encourage the reluctant readers, who have been rather side-lined in the examined selection of texts, as well as narrow the gender gap, a challenge that—despite being very foregrounded in the PISA and PIRLS results—is surprisingly not very explicit in the reviewed articles.

Reading for pleasure pedagogy plays a crucial role here. It refers to teaching methods and approaches that aim to promote reading for pleasure among students and typically involves a wide range of reading materials to choose from, encouraging students to read for enjoyment and personal fulfilment. Reading for pleasure pedagogy can take many forms and practices, including social reading environments, reading aloud, independent reading and informal book talks (Safford, 2014 ). It implies studying the specific characteristics of texts and materials that are most likely to be engaging and enjoyable for students, and provides guidelines on how teachers can use these materials to encourage reading for pleasure. However, there is a need to further investigate reading for pleasure pedagogy in order to better understand the specific strategies and approaches that are effective in promoting pleasure-reading among students.

We need new ways of contextualizing reading for pleasure that would fit with the range of practices emerging in an increasingly digital age. We have to pay attention to the environmental and interactive dimension of reading encounters. In short, we need to grasp reading for pleasure as personalised, embedded and situated phenomenon and ensure the conditions for practicing it. On the basis of the above observations a solid standardised methodology for ‘measuring’ reading for pleasure, or rather for measuring the efficacy of reading for pleasure pedagogy, can and should be created. What we need is an integration of a more detailed knowledge and practice, which would help educators and policy makers gain a deeper understanding of how to promote a love of reading.

The real actor in the pedagogy of reading for pleasure, however, is the teacher. Teachers’ knowledge of children’s and young adult literature and other texts, of their reading practices, of reading for pleasure itself and of pedagogical approaches with concrete tools and equipment is the key factor in promoting reading for pleasure. In line with the need to develop personalized methods and relational approaches, we need to equip teachers with professional knowledge and also with enough time to get to know the readers and develop appropriate and tailored strategies to integrate reading for pleasure into the curricula. This requires systematic support and cannot depend on individual teachers.

One of the ways in which it would be possible to help the teachers and other reading mentors getting to know the readers is creating the methodology for profiling the readers according to their skills, practices and attitudes, on the basis of which a more thorough personalisation could be made. This is even more important since there is a pronounced need for a more targeted research on poor and reluctant readers, which are the least represented in the research, the hardest to reach, and for whom reading for pleasure is more difficult to experience.

Apart from that and in order to provide support for the often over-burdened teachers we believe schools could benefit from cooperation with the external ‘reading motivators’, properly educated and school-unrelated librarians, that would take over a set of reading for pleasure-related workshops, tailor-made on the basis of the profiles and the related reading pathways, as well as on individual interaction. Also, bringing somebody from ‘the outside’ could help create a more relaxed, less ‘schoolish’ atmosphere and contribute to a more effective pursuit of reading for pleasure.

So far, what seems to have been achieved through research on reading for pleasure is a recognition of the importance of reading for pleasure; now we need to ensure it finds its regular place in everyday contexts. Despite the obvious emphasis on children and the young in school context, we have to keep in mind that reading for pleasure needs to be fostered also in relation to other populations, not necessarily linked to educational institutions.

In this study, we conducted a narrative review of a selection of articles published between 2014 and 2022 that focused on reading for pleasure. The review analysed articles on reading for pleasure published in various disciplines, mainly in education and in literacy, reading and language research, but including also library and information science, and psychology. Most of them are traditional research articles using qualitative methodology. Research on reading for pleasure has been conducted in various countries and continents, indicating that there is a widespread interest in understanding the benefits and promoting this activity. As the majority of the articles were published after 2017, the trend might be indicating a growing interest in the topic. The target groups of the articles varied, with a majority focusing on minor readers (e.g., Ghalebandi & Noorhidawati, 2019 ; Kucirkova et al., 2017 ; Vanden Dool & Simpson, 2021 ), although there was a wide range in the ages and sizes of the populations studied. Participants in the research were mostly fluent readers, that is, good and average high or secondary school and university students (Sullivan & Brown, 2015 ; Thissen et al., 2021 ; Willard & Buddies, 2019 ), which indicates the centrality of educational context in the discourse on reading for pleasure. This is also reflected in the fact that more articles consider reading for pleasure primarily as means to achieve better reading skills and literacy-related benefits, rather than in connection to other positive outcomes (e.g., Arai, 2022 ; Kavi et al., 2015 ; Li & Wah Chu, 2021 ). A good half of the reviewed texts considers a broad understanding of reading, including digital media forms, and acknowledges the importance of the social dimension in reading for pleasure (e.g., Burnett & Merchant, 2018 ; Kucirkova & Cremin, 2018 ; McKnight, 2018 ).

Referring to our initial research questions, we could summarize that the articles focus on the benefits of reading for pleasure, present practical examples of reading for pleasure promotion, especially in relation to the digital environment, analyse perceptions and attitudes towards reading for pleasure, discuss the nature of pleasure, and the role of schools and libraries in ensuring reading for pleasure. The findings suggest that reading for pleasure has a positive impact on various aspects of education and personal development (e.g., Sullivan & Brown, 2015 ; Willard & Buddie, 2019 ), and that it is important to promote and encourage this activity. Almost two thirds of the articles in some way or another define reading for pleasure, almost one third analyse it in more detail and over one third specifically address reading for pleasure pedagogy. What stands out is a noticeable endeavour for a better, in-depth understanding of what brings pleasure in reading, the focus on the reader and a personalized approach of reading for pleasure, as well as the articulated need of developing reading for pleasure pedagogy.

Limitations

A relatively small number of the articles under examination limits the representability of our review results, however, we believe that we have nevertheless identified the current trends and challenges, as well as signalled potential solutions and thus in a small way contributed to the empowerment of reading for pleasure.

For the PISA and PIRLS results documentation see https://www.oecd.org/pisa/data/ and https://www.iea.nl/studies/iea/pirls .

According to PISA definition, reading engagement refers to time spent reading for pleasure, time spent reading a diversity of material, high motivation and interest in reading (Kirsch et al.: Reading for change, results from PISA 2000). In 2019 PISA survey, the definition of reader engagement was complemented in line with OECD 2016 broader conception of reading, which recognizes the existence of motivational and behavioural characteristics of reading, in addition to cognitive ones, stating that engaged readers find satisfaction in reflecting on the meaning of the text and are likely to want to discuss the texts with others.

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Vogrinčič Čepič, A., Mascia, T. & Aerila, JA. Reading for Pleasure: A Review of Current Research. NZ J Educ Stud (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40841-024-00313-x

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The Pleasure of Reading to Impress Yourself

By Rebecca Mead

Not long ago, I unearthed a notebook I had long ago misplaced: a small blue ledger in which, for a period of about four years, I recorded the title of each book I was reading as I finished it. The record begins in mid-July of 1983, around the outset of the summer break before my penultimate year of high school, and the first book listed is “Dr. Zhivago,” by Boris Pasternak. I don’t remember reading that book, or why I thought that the reading of it merited the instigation of a list. Likely, I had a sense that Russian literature was important, but nobody had yet pointed me in the direction of Tolstoy. Next up was Maxim Gorky, “The Life of a Useless Man.” (Ditto.) Before the month was out, I had torn through “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” in a single day—I certainly remember that experience—and had also dispatched with “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.”

Leafing through the notebook provides me with the pleasure of recovering a cache of long-lost photographs. Some of the images are out of focus, some feature individuals whose names have long been forgotten, and others provide moments of sharp recognition. In February, 1984, under the influence of a boyfriend who fancied himself a Wildean wit, I read “The Importance of Being Earnest.” (You never forget your first aphorist.) That March, I read “The Trial,” which I vaguely recall being recommended to me by some other young man of high seriousness and literary inclination—but precisely which such young man now escapes me. The May that I was seventeen, I read “Middlemarch” in the space of two weeks, a reminder of how little else there was to do in my narrow English coastal town. The Wildean boyfriend lived, exotically enough, in distant London, a useful arrangement if one is developing a taste for nineteenth-century novels. A couple of months later, I consumed “Daniel Deronda” in two weeks, too.

I made no record of what I thought of any of these books; in my private Goodreads list, there is no starring system. There’s no indication of why I chose the works I did, though since I bought most of my books cheaply, in secondhand shops, the selection was somewhat dictated by availability. (That probably explains why my first Henry James, in July, 1984, was “The Europeans,” rather than “The Portrait of a Lady.”) Most of them were not assigned texts, at least in the years before I went to university, though there is a certain inevitability about the appearance of many of them: it is axiomatic that a young woman who reads will discover “The Bell Jar,” as I did in September, 1984. This was a curriculum stumbled into: a few titles culled from the shelves at home; others coming my way from friends at school; and yet others recommended mostly by the Penguin Classics logo on their spine.

My list has its limitations. It’s weighted toward classics of English literature from the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth, and, apart from excursions into the Russians and Europeans, it doesn’t range very widely geographically. There was little contemporary literature on it until I discovered the riches of the Picador paperback imprint, while at college. (Milan Kundera, Julian Barnes, Salman Rushdie, Gabriel García Márquez, Italo Calvino, Ian McEwan.) The notebook fizzles out in 1987, around my twenty-first birthday, by which time I was not only studying literature but also reviewing books for a student magazine. One of those was the last title on my list: “Mensonge,” a satire of literary post-structuralism, by the British campus novelist Malcolm Bradbury. That it was this book that killed off my catalogue—which in my college years encompassed Chaucer, Dante, Milton, Donne, Shelley, Coleridge, Eliot, Yeats—strikes me as what the deconstructionists used to call ludic.

After I found the notebook, I tweeted an image of one of its pages, which covered four months of my reading at the age of seventeen. Among the titles were “Great Expectations,” “The Waves,” three Austens, and two Fitzgeralds, as well as books by Elias Canetti, Dostoyevsky, and William Golding, for whom, the notebook reminds me, I had a particular taste at the time. One response: “No fun reads or guilty pleasures?”

It’s a common and easy enough distinction, this separation of books into those we read because we want to and those we read because we have to, and it serves as a useful marketing trope for publishers, especially when they are trying to get readers to take this book rather than that one to the beach. But it’s a flawed and pernicious division. This linking of pleasure and guilt is intended as an enticement, not as an admonition: reading for guilty pleasure is like letting one’s diet slide for a day—naughty but relatively harmless. The distinction partakes of a debased cultural Puritanism, which insists that the only fun to be had with a book is the frivolous kind, or that it’s necessarily a pleasure to read something accessible and easy. Associating pleasure and guilt in this way presumes an anterior, scolding authority—one which insists that reading must be work.

But there are pleasures to be had from books beyond being lightly entertained. There is the pleasure of being challenged; the pleasure of feeling one’s range and capacities expanding; the pleasure of entering into an unfamiliar world, and being led into empathy with a consciousness very different from one’s own; the pleasure of knowing what others have already thought it worth knowing, and entering a larger conversation. Among my catalogue are some books that I am sure I was—to use an expression applied to elementary-school children—decoding rather than reading. Such, I suspect, was the case with “Ulysses,” a book I read at eighteen, without having first read “The Odyssey,” which might have deepened my appreciation of Joyce. Even so—and especially when considering adolescence—we should not underestimate the very real pleasure of being pleased with oneself. What my notebook offers me is a portrait of the reader as a young woman, or at the very least, a sketch. I wanted to read well, but I also wanted to become well read. The notebook is a small record of accomplishment, but it’s also an outline of large aspiration. There’s pleasure in ambition, too.

We have become accustomed to hearing commercial novelists express frustration with the ways in which their books are taken less seriously than ones that are deemed literary: book reviewers don’t pay them enough attention, while publishers give their works safe, predictable cover treatments. In this debate, academic arguments that have been conducted for more than a generation, about the validity or otherwise of a literary canon, meet the marketplace. The debate has its merits, but less discussed has been the converse consequence of the popular-literary distinction: that literary works, especially those not written last year, are placed at the opposite pole to fun.

My list reminds me of a time when I was more or less in ignorance of this proposition. It may not include any examples of what I later learned to call commercial fiction: I did not, for example, read “Hollywood Wives,” by Jackie Collins, which had been published the same year that I started the list, and I am not sure I had even heard of it. But I can’t imagine that it could have given me more delight than did the romantic travails that ironically unfold in “Emma,” or that its satisfactions could possibly have been greater than those offered by the lyricism and very adult drama of “Tender is the Night.” The fallacy that the pleasures offered by reading must necessarily be pleasures to which a self-defeating sense of shame is attached offers a very impoverished definition of gratification, whatever book we choose to pull from the shelf.

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Elliott Abrams and the Contradictions of U.S. Human-Rights Policy

By Isaac Chotiner

By Louis Menand

By David Remnick

By Nathan Heller

The paradoxical pleasures of reading literature

By Robert DiYanni April 21, 2021

Reading literature is a deeply dialectical experience, one that offers a variety of paradoxical pleasures. One of the most salient of these is that in reading well we both submit to the text and resist it. In reading literature especially, to a significant extent, we surrender ourselves to the writer’s vision if not necessarily the writer’s values. But we also resist what we read, questioning it, challenging it, modifying it in ways we find necessary.

The pleasure of this dialectical textual response requires some meaningful connection with the person on the other side of the reading transaction. And so a second paradoxical pleasure is that reading is both solitary and social. The image of the individual reader absorbed in a book, addictively hooked, irretrievably lost, so fully transported that time seems to stop, remains a compelling one. In “The House Was Quiet and the World Was Calm,” Wallace Stevens describes such an engrossed reader merging with a book. Stevens’s reader becomes the book; nothing separates them; there is no need for mediation; reader and book are fused.

And yet that sole reader, paradoxically, is not alone at all. Every reader truly engaged in an authentic act of reading is connected, at least, minimally, with one other person—with the writer himself or herself (or the illusion or trace of the writer), as well as with the speaker, narrator, and character(s) the writer’s work brings to life.

The reader’s pleasures are not exclusively solitary pleasures; they are social pleasures as well—the pleasures of society beyond the reader’s connection with the writer alone, pleasures manifested in our conversations about books with friends and acquaintances. They are reflected, too, in readers’ joining together in book clubs run through schools and libraries and other civic associations.

Here are ten dialectical tensions to add to this first pair, constituting all together an even dozen paradoxical pleasures of reading:

The tension between “text” and “work,” the black marks on the white page (“text”), and the version of the work we readers bring to life in our minds as we read (“work”). Or, alternatively, the tension between the work as created by the author and the work as recreated by us as we read.
The tension between the temporal flow of reading—making sense as we go through the text—and making additional sense in retrospect , in the tranquility of post-reading reflection. Forward and backward reading. The tension between the text in motion and the text at rest.
The tension between the pleasures associated with finality and those associated with deferral ; the delights of progressing slowly and forestalling, and thereby heightening, the pleasures of closure. And the pleasure of ending, finishing, concluding.
The tension between the text as a mirror in which we see ourselves and the text as a window into a strange other world, which is both disorienting and exciting as we encounter that world and the “other” in it. The tension between reading toward the self and reading toward the world .
The tension between the text as visible and invisible —as an artifact you examine and as a place in which you lose yourself in its story and its world. “Foregrounding the text as an object of interest,” as Lydia Davis notes; and losing sight of your discriminating mind while reading.
The tension between author consciousness and reader consciousness , between mindlessness —giving your mind over to the author—and mindfulness —maintaining control of your mind; a tension related to that of submission and resistance.
The tension between the formation and the breaking of illusions; the tension between suspending and asserting disbelief . The tension between skepticism and belief, between doubt and trust.
The tension between the implied reader and the actual reader ; the gap between what the text requires of us and what we bring to texts and make of them in all our idiosyncratic particularity. The tension between the potential and the actual, the ideal reader and actual readers.
The tension between the text/work as finished and the text/work as unfinished —the closed versus the open work.
The tension between the work as an independent self-contained aesthetic object and the work as embedded, connected, contextualized in a larger social structure. The text as a singular self-enclosed authorial production and the text as a relational social artifact with ties to the world.

These oppositional strains pull inward toward the reader’s concerns and push outward , away from the self-centered reader, taking readers beyond themselves. On one hand, reading looks into textual relationships within a work—images, details, actions, and other patterns— intra -textual reading. On the other, reading looks out toward textual connections beyond a work, between and among the text and other texts and contexts— inter -textual reading. Inward-directed and outward-directed reading complement and reinforce each other. They deepen each other, enrich each other, complete each other. Theirs is a dialectical relationship, a marriage of reconcilable dualities.

Robert DiYanni is an Adjunct Professor of Humanities at New York University and author of The Craft of College Teaching .

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The Pleasure of Reading

"The tales and myths and legends did, I am now more sure than ever I was, exactly what Coleridge said they did. They made it clear there was another world, beside the world of having to be a child in a house, an inner world and a vast outer world with large implications - good and evil, angels and demons, fate and love and terror and beauty - and the comfort of the inevitable ending, not only the happy ending against odds, but the tragic one too." - A.S. Byatt

The Pleasure of Reading is a delightful and revealing collection, edited by Antonia Fraser and featuring over forty acclaimed writers from all corners of the globe and in a period spanning seventy six years, all of whom are bound by their shared passion for reading, including Margaret Atwood, Carol Ann Duffy, Simon Gray, Alan Hollinghurst, Doris Lessing, Roger McGough and patrons of The Reader Organisation A.S. Byatt and Jeanette Winterson .

First published in 1992 in hardback only, this new edition includes essays from five younger writers, including Orange Prize shortlisted author Kamila Shamsie:

"It started with a bear, and a boy in search of his shadow. Winnie-the-Pooh and Peter Pan were the twin companions of my earliest memories (an animal and a child – this has a certain symmetry; in my un-reading life, the primary companions of those days were an Alsatian called Dusty, and my sister). Of the two, it was Peter who lodged himself most deeply in my heart, making me dream of adventurers who would dart in through the open window at night and fly me away to Neverland. In the world of J. M. Barrie parents are understandably wary of Peter and his home ‘second to the right and straight on to morning’ but in my world it was my mother who pointed out to me that Neverland was just off the coast of Karachi, located on a series of small islets, known as Oyster Rocks by the unknowing; that two of the islets looked like granite sentinels made her claim seem all the more plausible. So although Peter might fly into rooms in London he ended up just off the coast on which I lived; a comforting thought. [...] In the Karachi of my childhood, where we had one state-run television channel and a sheltered life which rarely extended beyond the school yard and private homes, I walked through that wardrobe, flew to Neverland with the boy and his shadow. And in doing so I learnt that novels reach further than their own writers’ imagination. Who do you write for? I am often asked, the question framed in terms of nation or ethnicity. My own childhood reading makes me impatient of such questions. C. S. Lewis is unlikely to have ‘written for’ a girl in Karachi, but that doesn’t mean any boy in London grew up with a greater claim on Aslan than I did. There were things I didn’t understand, of course – What was Turkish delight to begin with? Why did all the children drink tea, which was clearly a boring beverage for grown-ups? – but I was happy to read around what I didn’t understand, some- times accepting other rules of living, other times inventing my own explanations. Finding ways of contending with the mystification was as much a part of the joy of reading as was entering fictional worlds and changing their rules (I refer you back to girls and the darning of socks). It is a great gift to a writer, this early knowledge that there will always be people who don’t know the world you’re writing about, will miss allegories and allusions, and yet will love your books."

Royalties from the book will go to Give A Book , who seek to get books into the places where they will be of most benefit. Give A Book work in conjunction with Age UK and Maggie's Centres as well as other literacy projects, and have supported several of our shared reading groups in London with the donation of new book sets - much to the enjoyment of our readers.

For more information about The Pleasure of Reading , see Bloomsbury Books website .

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Reader Revisited: An Interview with Mark Rylance, actor and writer of ‘I Am Shakespeare’

We're taking a trip down memory lane and revisiting articles from The Reader Magazine. This article first appeared in issue 29.…

April’s Monthly Stories and Poems

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Importance of Reading Essay

500+ words essay on reading.

Reading is a key to learning. It’s a skill that everyone should develop in their life. The ability to read enables us to discover new facts and opens the door to a new world of ideas, stories and opportunities. We can gather ample information and use it in the right direction to perform various tasks in our life. The habit of reading also increases our knowledge and makes us more intellectual and sensible. With the help of this essay on the Importance of Reading, we will help you know the benefits of reading and its various advantages in our life. Students must go through this essay in detail, as it will help them to create their own essay based on this topic.

Importance of Reading

Reading is one of the best hobbies that one can have. It’s fun to read different types of books. By reading the books, we get to know the people of different areas around the world, different cultures, traditions and much more. There is so much to explore by reading different books. They are the abundance of knowledge and are best friends of human beings. We get to know about every field and area by reading books related to it. There are various types of books available in the market, such as science and technology books, fictitious books, cultural books, historical events and wars related books etc. Also, there are many magazines and novels which people can read anytime and anywhere while travelling to utilise their time effectively.

Benefits of Reading for Students

Reading plays an important role in academics and has an impactful influence on learning. Researchers have highlighted the value of developing reading skills and the benefits of reading to children at an early age. Children who cannot read well at the end of primary school are less likely to succeed in secondary school and, in adulthood, are likely to earn less than their peers. Therefore, the focus is given to encouraging students to develop reading habits.

Reading is an indispensable skill. It is fundamentally interrelated to the process of education and to students achieving educational success. Reading helps students to learn how to use language to make sense of words. It improves their vocabulary, information-processing skills and comprehension. Discussions generated by reading in the classroom can be used to encourage students to construct meanings and connect ideas and experiences across texts. They can use their knowledge to clear their doubts and understand the topic in a better way. The development of good reading habits and skills improves students’ ability to write.

In today’s world of the modern age and digital era, people can easily access resources online for reading. The online books and availability of ebooks in the form of pdf have made reading much easier. So, everyone should build this habit of reading and devote at least 30 minutes daily. If someone is a beginner, then they can start reading the books based on the area of their interest. By doing so, they will gradually build up a habit of reading and start enjoying it.

Frequently Asked Questions on the Importance of Reading Essay

What is the importance of reading.

1. Improves general knowledge 2. Expands attention span/vocabulary 3. Helps in focusing better 4. Enhances language proficiency

What is the power of reading?

1. Develop inference 2. Improves comprehension skills 3. Cohesive learning 4. Broadens knowledge of various topics

How can reading change a student’s life?

1. Empathy towards others 2. Acquisition of qualities like kindness, courtesy

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Essay on “Pleasures of Reading” Complete Essay for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

Pleasures of reading.

Books as Friends

Essay No. 01

A book is always a source of pleasures. It is constant companion to man in weal or woe. It is a source of knowledge as well as entertainment. Books contain the best of the thoughts of their authors. Robert Southey, a well- known lover of books, wrote:

“My never-failing friends are they, With whom I converse day by day. With them I take delight in weal, And seek relief in woe.”

Everybody wants recreation after hard work. It is a biological necessity. Books are a ‘great source of entertainment and recreation.’ They share the readers’ joys and sorrows. A lover of books comes back home a very relaxed man after a visit to the library. For him, the library is a temple of learning and a source of pleasures. With its excellent academic, peaceful and educative atmosphere, a library is a place of peace, quiet and serenity. J.B. Macaulay once said,” I would rather be a poor man in a place garret with plenty of books than a king who did not love reading.” Henry David Thoreau rightly remarked, “Books are the treasured wealth of the world, the fit inheritance of generations and nations.

Reading books can introduce a new charm in life. A book is the precious life blood of a master mind. Books bring us in contact with the greatest scholars of the past and the present. As we get into the spirit of a book our entire attitude is changed. Books share our joys and sorrows. When we are in a happy mood, we share our pleasures in the company of books. In our sadder moments, books act as our nurses or guardians and provide us with words of encouragement and consolation. Books are, therefore, the best of friends. Our human friends may desert us, but books do not desert us in any circumstances. They stand by us through thick and thin.

Books entertain and delight their readers. Reading is a thrilling and an enchanting experience. Books are the pearls of wisdom. The best of human knowledge and thought is condensed in them. They act as beacon lights to illumine our path on the dark and vast ocean of life. Just as they relieve the boredom of journey in trains or buses, they also act as a stay and a support in the long journey of our life in his world.

Bacon felt: “Reading maketh a full man.” In fact, reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. Realising the immense value of reading. Gibbon once asserted,” My early and invincible love of reading I would not exchange with the treasures of India.”

As far as possible, our endeavour should be read the well-known and famed literature only. But falling into the habit of reading cheap and inferior books, reading can become a curse as well. It will poison the stream of our thought and make our mind a haunt of devilish ideas. Choice of books is of first and foremost importance. It is again, more useful to read wisely than to read carelessly and hurriedly.

The great masterpieces, famous novels, biographies, books of philosophy and history have their own importance in human life. A proper and health pleasure comes from understanding properly what we read. No doubt, it requires a hard training and disciplining of our mind. But once this art is learnt, there is no end to the satisfaction and deep contentment which we can derive from this art. Milton has rightly said: “A good books is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose for a life beyond.”

Essay No. 02

Reading for Pleasure

Reading gives unique pleasure. The pleasures of reading are many. They differ from reader to reader. Sober and intellectual people prefer reading history books, philosophical treatises or books of serious nature. To an emotional reader, books of drama, poetry, travel, fiction and essays give great delight. While many others like to read stories, jokes, comics, detective material and such other books. But there cannot be any doubt that the pleasure of reading is the best. One can spend ones leisure in other pleasure pursuits as well, but reading has no equal. Reading has so many additional advantages which no other hobby or leisure time pursuit can give. The ability to read and relish books is really a boon. Reading provides delight, experience, entertainment and skills in various fields of life.

According to Francis Bacon, “Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested, that is, some books are to be read only in parts, others to be read but not curiously, and some few to be read wholly, and with deligence and attention. Some books also may be read by depth and extract made of them by others”. Again he says, “Reading makes a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man”. Bacon has write on all aspects of study and reading of various subjects. He further says, “Histories make men wise; poetry witty; the mathematics subtle; natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to contend”

To get pleasure out of reading, one has to cultivate the habit of reading. Reading requires intelligence, quick comprehension, patience, love of solitude and certain language skills. One might be well educated, but it does not mean that one can surely drive pleasure from. reading or that one can engage himself in reading. It needs a special aptitude, but it can be easily acquired and developed. Unfortunately most of the students read for getting through the examination only. They read neither for pleasure, nor for culture and knowledge. It is really a matter of pity that modern young men and women waste their time in playing-cards, viewing films, television programmes or in gossiping for relaxation and pleasure. Books are really a treasure-house of pleasure, knowledge, experience, intellectual food and refreshment. They are the best friends, which would never leave you in the lurch. You can read a book at your pleasure and convenience, in a corner of your room, in bed, while travelling, while taking tea and breakfast. One can read in the libraries, classrooms, waiting halls at airports, railway and bus stations. The relief, relaxation, refreshment and mental food provided by reading is matchless. The experience gained through reading ever stands in good stead with the reader.

Modern age is the age of information. We can keep our-selves well informed about various topics and things by reading books, magazines, newspapers, bulletins, etc. There are books of fiction, stories, biographies, travels, adventures, philosophies, histories, phantasm, poetry, drama, one act plays, humor, etc. There is no end to the variety reading and books offer us. You can choose any topic and subject to suit your aptitude, leisure, duration, pocket and occasion. While travelling you can enjoy a fiction, a collection of short stories, poems, a magazine or a newspaper. Before going to bed one can again enjoy some light and instructive reading. Most of the light type of reading does not demand any appreciable mental application and exercise on the part of a reader.

Most of the novels, short stories, magazines come under this category. Besides giving pleasure, they enrich our experience, knowledge, broaden our outlook and stimulate thinking. Moreover, it is not a costly hobby. You can borrow books from friends and libraries. You can buy books according to your pocket. Cheap and second hand books can also be bought to our great advantage. The money spent on books is really a sound investment. For reading you do not depend on others, as you would do if you play cards, chess, football, etc.

Books are called the life-blood of master spirits. We can become intimate with Shakespeare, Kalidas, Tulsidas, Prem Chand and Rabindra Nath Tagore by reading their works. Thus, we can share their experiences, joys, sorrows, emotion, thoughts and feelings. Books can move us to tears both of delight and sorrow. There is a complete identity between a reader and the characters of a novel, story or a play. The magic and charm of reading defies description. Through reading we establish bonds of close relationship with various authors. Their creations, etc., which is far more intimate and last in a then that of an intimate friend. The pleasures of reading can be recreated time and again. It can be imparted to others. Reading is a sure protection against boredom, loneliness, pain, suffering, frustration and various complexes. In the words of Thomas Carlyle, “All that mankind has done, thought, gained, or been; it is Lying as in magic preservation in the pages of books. They are the chosen possession of men.” To a cultivated and educated person, books provide the finest of pleasures. But we must choose our reading material with care and caution. There are many cheap and substandard books which can poison young minds and mislead them on paths undesirable. In the selection of books you can consult your teachers, elders, librarians, etc. Then there are book-reviews to guide you to better reading materials. Avoid cheap, sensational, sexy, obscene and trash reading material. We must be judicious in our reading. We should gradually make our own small library of choicest books. Books which can encourage, inspire, guide and entertain should be treasured.

Essay No. 03

Rightly did Francis Bacon say, “Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man, and writing an exact man.” Reading is the first step to attaining richness of personality and full development. Happy is the person who acquires the habit of reading when he is young. He has secured a lifelong source of pleasure, instruction and inspiration. So long as he is in the company of his beloved books, he need never feel lonely. He always has a pleasant occupation in his moments of leisure. He can never fell bored or frustrated. Ruskin called books “Kings’ Treasures”—treasures filled, not with gold and silver and precious stones, but with riches more valuable than these—knowledge, noble thoughts and high ideals. Poor, indeed is the man who does not read, and empty is his life.

Reading is of different kinds. First, there is light reading, which means the reading of newspapers, periodicals, journals, etc., Newspapers and journals are storehouses of information about current events. Through them we come to know about all that is happening in every part of the world. The modern age is such that we can ill-afford to miss at least this type of light reading. We will be like a frog in a well without newspapers. Therefore, such reading, as is both delightful and instructive, cannot be ignored.

Next we come to the books on travel and adventure. Man wants to escape from the dull realities of everyday life, the spirit of adventure is in the very blood of man. Books of travel and adventure infuse into us the same spirit of adventure and fearlessness as was displayed by the travelers themselves. The reading of novels is a pleasant pastime and nothing is more entertaining than to spend some time reading a novel in the afternoon or in a train. The reader forgets his own personality and existence. For a short time, he identifies himself with one of the characters. This identification of the reader with the hero or heroine, though unconscious, is a source of endless pleasure to him.

Then there are books of serious reading. They include works of literature, history, philosophy, etc., which may be called books of all times. Such books are intended for sober and thoughtful minds. A student of literature comes in contact with the master minds of all ages and finds a good deal of food for his thought. They give him an insight into the spiritual values of life. He can thus make his life noble and sublime. His outlook is widened and the field of human sympathy broadened.

Now we come to the most important question, viz., how to read books ? Bacon has said, “Some books are to be tasted, others are to be swallowed and some few to be chewed and digested”. To treat a book as a textbook has the sense of compulsion. This compulsion may be useful, but it kills all interest. Nobody can appreciate such a temporary love of books. A real lover of books enjoys their company all the time.

We should be very careful in the choice of books. If bad books come into the hands of the young, their minds are infected with their evil influence. Many promising youths have been ruined because of the taste for bad books. Good books, on the other hand, are purifying. They enlarge and enrich the mind and mould our character. Therefore, it is necessary that the youth should seek advice from those who are competent to give it.

The habit of reading is a sign of culture. It is a great source of enjoyment and the best means of utilising leisure. Books are a treasure richer than any king’s treasure. They are the gold mines of art, literature, science and information. They are our constant companions. We must value them.

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Dr Hilary Cass speaks about the publication of the Independent Review of Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People (The Cass Review), London, 9 April 2024.

The Cass review of gender identity services marks a return to reason and evidence – it must be defended

Its author has had to fend off criticism and misinformation, but the report offers hope for a realistic conversation

A s the dust settles around Hilary Cass’s report – the most extensive and thoroughgoing evidence-based review of treatment for children experiencing gender distress ever undertaken – it is clear her findings support the grave concerns I and many others have raised. Central here was the lack of an evidential base of good quality that could back claims for the effectiveness of young people being prescribed puberty blockers or proceeding on a medical pathway to transition. I and many other clinicians were concerned about the risks of long-term damaging consequences of early medical intervention. Cass has already had to speak out against misinformation being spread about her review, and a Labour MP has admitted she “may have misled” Parliament when referring to it. The review should be defended from misrepresentation.

The policy of “affirmation” – that is, speedily agreeing with a child that they are of the wrong gender – was an inappropriate clinical stance brought about by influential activist groups and some senior gender identity development service (Gids) staff, resulting in a distortion of the clinical domain. Studies indicate that a majority of children in the absence of medical intervention will desist – that is, change their minds.

The many complex problems that affect these young people were left unaddressed once they were viewed simplistically through the prism of gender. Cass helpfully calls this “diagnostic overshadowing”. Thus children suffered thrice over: through not having all their problems properly addressed; by being put on a pathway for which there is not adequate evidence and for which there is considerable risk of harm; and lastly because children not unreasonably believed that all their problems would disappear once they transitioned. It is, I think, not possible for a child in acute states of torment to be able to think through consequences of a future medical transition. Children struggle to even imagine themselves in an adult sexual body.

Some claim that low numbers of puberty blockers were prescribed. Cass quotes figures showing around 30% of Gids patients in England discharged between April 2018 and 31 December 2022 were referred to the endocrinology service, of whom around 80% were prescribed puberty blockers; the proportion was higher for older children. But these numbers are likely to be an underestimate, as 70% of children were transferred to adult services once they were 17, and their data lost, as very regrettably they were not followed up. This is one of the most serious governance problems of Gids – also specifically addressed by the judges in Keira Bell v Tavistock . Six adult gender clinics refused to cooperate and provide data to Cass. However, having come under considerable pressure, they have now relented .

It is often claimed that puberty blockers were not experimental, as there is a long history of their use. They had been used in precocious puberty (for example where a child, sometimes because of a pituitary abnormality, develops secondary sexual characteristics before the age of eight) and in the treatment of prostate cancer. But they had not been prescribed by Gids to children experiencing gender dysphoria before 2011 . The lack of long-term evidence underlies the decision of the NHS to put an end to their routine prescription for children as a treatment for gender dysphoria – that is, for those whose bodies were physically healthy.

The attempts of Gids clinicians to raise concerns about safeguarding and the medical approach were ignored or worse . The then medical director heard concerns but did not act; ditto the Speak up Guardian and the Tavistock and Portman NHS foundation trust management. I was a senior consultant psychiatrist, and it was in my role as staff representative on the trust council of governors that a large number of the Gids clinicians approached me with their grave concerns. This formed the basis of the report submitted to the board in 2018. The trust then conducted a “review” of Gids, based only on interviewing staff. The CEO stated that the review did not identify any “failings in the overall approach taken by the service in responding to the needs of the young people and families who access its support”. I was threatened with disciplinary action . When the child safeguarding lead, Sonia Appleby, raised her concerns before the trust’s review, the trust threatened her with an investigation; and its response, as an employment tribunal later confirmed, damaged her professional reputation and stood in the way of her safeguarding work.

Characterising a child as “being transgender” is harmful as it forecloses the situation and also implies that this is a unitary condition for which there is unitary “treatment”. It is much more helpful to use a description: that the child suffers from distress in relation to gender/sexuality, and this needs to be carefully explored in terms of the narrative of their lives, the presence of other difficulties such as autism, depression, histories of abuse and trauma, and confusion about sexuality. As the Cass report notes, studies suggest that a high proportion of these children are same-sex attracted, and many suffer from homophobia. Concerned gay and lesbian clinicians have said they experienced homophobia in the service, and that staff worked in a “climate of fear”.

It is misleading to suggest that I and others who have raised these concerns are hostile to transgender people – we believe they should be able to live their lives free of discrimination, and we want them to have safe, evidence-based holistic healthcare. What we have opposed is the precipitate placing of children on a potentially damaging medical pathway for which there is considerable evidence of risk of harm. We emphasised the need, before taking such steps, to spend considerable time exploring this complex and multifaceted clinical presentation. Young people and clinicians routinely refer to “top surgery” and “bottom surgery”, terms that serve to seriously underplay these major surgical procedures, ie double mastectomy, removal of pelvic organs and fashioning of constructed penis or vagina. These procedures carry very serious risks such as urinary incontinence, vaginal atrophy, cardiovascular complications and many others we are only beginning to learn about. There is a very serious risk of sexual dysfunction and sterility.

There are no reliable studies (for children or adults) that could support claims of low levels of regret. The studies often quoted (eg Bustos et al 2021) have been criticised for using inadequate and erroneous data . The critical issue here is the fact that children and young people who were put on a medical pathway were not followed up. Studies suggest that the majority of detransitioners, a growing population, who are having to deal with the consequences of having been put on a medical pathway, do not return to the clinics as they are very fearful of the consequences. The fact that there are no dedicated NHS services for detransitioners is symptomatic of the NHS’s lack of concern for this group. Many live very lonely and isolated lives.

Those who say a child has been “born in the wrong body”, and who have sidelined child safeguarding, bear a very heavy responsibility. Parents have been asked “Do you want a happy little girl or a dead little boy?” Cass notes that rates of suicidality are similar to rates among non-trans identified youth referred to child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS). Indeed, the NHS lead for suicide prevention, Prof Sir Louis Appleby, has said “invoking suicide in this debate is mistaken and potentially harmful”.

It has been suggested that the Cass report sought to “appease” various interests, with the implication that those who have promoted these potentially damaging treatments have been sidelined. But in reality, it is those of us who have raised these concerns who have been silenced by trans rights activists who have had considerable success in closing down debate, including preventing conferences going ahead. Doctors and scientists have said that they have been deterred from conducting studies in this area by a climate of fear, and faced great personal costs for speaking out, ranging from harassment to professional risks and even, as Cass has experienced, safety concerns in public.

The pendulum is already swinging towards a reassertion of rationality. Cass’s achievement is to give that pendulum a hugely increased momentum. In years to come we will look back at the damage done to children with incredulity and horror.

David Bell is a retired psychiatrist and former president of the British Psychoanalytic Society

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here .

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Pleasure of Reading Essay
In order to protect oneself from the devil, one can always resort to reading and thus find pleasure in one's life. Pleasure of Reading Essay - The human mind is rational and does not take things for guaranteed. Man is constantly trying to run after knowledge and answers to the various questions that arise in his mind.
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Reading is a wonderful habit. It stays with us forever. When we read, we feel joy. We get into a different world as we read. Reading helps us forget all the problems of our life. When we study in school, we read books for examinations. It teaches us a lot. But at home, we also read storybooks. It is our biggest pleasure.
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Books. The Pleasure of Reading. Victoria Gray. Bloomsbury, Jan 1, 2015 - Literary Collections - 352 pages. In this delightful collection forty-three acclaimed writers explain what first made them interested in literature, what inspired them to read and what makes them continue to do so. First published in 1992 in hardback only, original ...
The Pleasure in/of the Text: About the Joys and Perversities of Reading
Taking his work as a central reference, and revisiting some of his seminal publications on the subject such as Empire of Signs (1970) and The Pleasure of the Text (1973), this collection of essays adopts a similar interdisciplinary approach to explore a broad range of themes and issues related to the notion of readerly enjoyment, between form ...
Readaxation and the power of reading for pleasure
Reading for pleasure allows a state of "engagement", offered by Martin Seligman and others as an importantly positive and transformative psychological state. It leads to increased self-worth, itself likely to reduce the stress of negative feelings. We can choose books to create a desired emotion.
The Benefits of Reading for Pleasure
In our book Reading Unbound, Michael Smith and I argue that promoting pleasure reading is a civil rights issue.Data from major longitudinal studies show that pleasure reading in youth is the most explanatory factor of both cognitive progress and social mobility over time (e.g., Sullivan & Brown, 2013 [PDF]; Guthrie, et al, 2001; and Kirsch, et al, 2002 [PDF]).
Reading for Pleasure: A Review of Current Research
The narrative review examines the current state of research on reading for pleasure and its relevance in education and personal development. By analysing 22 studies published over the past several years (2014-2022), the authors have sought to identify the key trends and areas of focus within this field. The selected articles have been coded and analysed, and the results have been used to ...
Pleasure of Reading Essay for Students in English
Reading for pleasure is oriented towards finding personal meaning and purpose. It enhances the understanding of the world, the desire to understand, make things work, make connections, engage emotionally and feel deeply among people. Reading helps in finding resonances in the text. Readers can understand the meaning and execute them in their ...
The Pleasure of Reading to Impress Yourself
The distinction partakes of a debased cultural Puritanism, which insists that the only fun to be had with a book is the frivolous kind, or that it's necessarily a pleasure to read something ...
The paradoxical pleasures of reading literature
Here are ten dialectical tensions to add to this first pair, constituting all together an even dozen paradoxical pleasures of reading: The tension between "text" and "work," the black marks on the white page ("text"), and the version of the work we readers bring to life in our minds as we read ("work"). Or, alternatively, the ...
The Pleasure of Reading
Really enjoyed this book :) And it brought back so many memories of my early years of reading . . . reading a book in bed under the covers at night by torch light . . . ALWAYS having a book to hand and being told to 'Put that book down!' . . . getting annoyed if ever a Birthday or Christmas Day passed WITHOUT A NEW BOOK arriving!!!
The Pleasure of Reading
First published in 1992 in hardback only, this new edition includes essays from five younger writers, including Orange Prize shortlisted author Kamila Shamsie: "It started with a bear, and a boy in search of his shadow. Winnie-the-Pooh and Peter Pan were the twin companions of my earliest memories (an animal and a child - this has a certain ...
The Pleasure of Reading
In this delightful collection, forty acclaimed writers explain what first made them interested in literature, what inspired them to read, and what makes them continue to do so. First published in 1992 in hardback only, original contributors include Margaret Atwood, J. G. Ballard, Melvyn Bragg, A. S. Byatt, Catherine Cookson, Carol Ann Duffy, Germaine Greer, Alan Hollinghurst, Doris Lessing ...
Reading for Pleasure: A Research Overview.
The path of a reader is not a runway but more a hack through a forest, with individual twists and turns, entanglements and moments of surprise. 3 Many thanks to the Thomson Corporation whose generous contribution has made this research possible. This paper explores reading for pleasure 1 , its importance, and its impact on literacy attainment and other outcomes. Reading is an important gateway ...
Importance of Reading Essay
1. Empathy towards others 2. Acquisition of qualities like kindness, courtesy. 500+ Words Essay on Importance of Reading is provided here to help students learn how to write an effective essay on this topic. They must go through this essay in-depth and then try to write their own essay.
from The Pleasure of Reading
This essay can be used early in Literature and Medicine courses to discuss the very different experiences of reading fiction and nonfiction, to show how their aims are opposed in many ways. According to Fowles, this includes: "learning to dream awake, against learning to absorb hard facts; almost, to be subjective, to learn to feel, to be ...
Essay on "Pleasures of Reading" Complete Essay for Class 10, Class 12
Essay No. 03 . Pleasures of Reading. Rightly did Francis Bacon say, "Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man, and writing an exact man." Reading is the first step to attaining richness of personality and full development. Happy is the person who acquires the habit of reading when he is young. He has secured a lifelong source of ...
Viscount Grey: The Pleasure of Reading
"On Doing Nothing," was one of Priestly's radio talks which was later put together in the book "Open House". Priestly describes a sunny day in this essay where he and his friend spent a day on a moor which was two thousand feet above sea level. A moor is a large area with not much going on in it.
The Cass review of gender identity services marks a return to reason
Its author has had to fend off criticism and misinformation, but the report offers hope for a realistic conversation As the dust settles around Hilary Cass's report - the most extensive and ...

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The Pleasure in/of the Text: About the Joys and Perversities of Reading

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Taking signs for what they are: Roland Barthes, Chris Marker and the pleasure of ‘Texte Japon’

The Benefits of Reading for Pleasure

The Pleasures of Reading

Promoting the Pleasures of Reading

Reading for Pleasure: A Review of Current Research

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