"70% of US adults have not been in a bookstore in the last five years."

Jeff Jarvis (via peterwknox)

"There has been a measurable cultural change in society’s commitment to literary reading. In a cultural moment when we are hearing nothing but bad news, we have reassuring evidence that the dumbing down of our culture is not inevitable."

Dana Gioia, chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, as quoted in this NYT article about a measurable increase in fiction reading. We can probably thank Oprah and Stephanie Meyer for this increase.

"An unread book is all possible stories." →

So begins Kirsty Logan’s essay Confined by Pages: The Joy of Unread Books. It’s a beautiful look at the power of imagination, and how unopened books can contain greater stories than anyone can possibly write down on paper.

"Writing comes from reading, and reading is the finest teacher of how to write."

Annie Proulx (via theparisreview)