What Makes Reading Fun?

Find Joy in Focus

It’s hard to get people interested in reading—and to have fun doing it.

Reading is basically sitting in a quiet room looking at a piece of paper. What am I at the DMV? Who wants to do paperwork? This isn’t most people’s idea of a fun weekend activity.

But, it’s not paperwork. It’s not waiting your turn or doing what you’re told. It’s activating your imagination and going anywhere in the world—all in your mind. Most people don’t have the money, power, or resources to go anywhere they want in the world. But, you can get a library card for free.

Reading is a magical gift that’s hard to explain. It’s why we use so many words.

For those of us who care about reading as an enriching way to engage with the arts, here are some concerning statistics shared by the National Endowment for the Arts.

. . . according to its 2022 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA), conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau, 48.5 percent of adults reported having read at least one book in the past year, compared with 52.7 percent five years earlier, and 54.6 percent ten years earlier. Meanwhile, in 2022, just 37.6 percent reported reading a novel or short story, compared with 41.8 percent in 2017 and 45.2 percent in 2012. As we said at the time, the fiction-reading rate was the lowest in the history of the SPPA, a survey that goes back more than three decades.

I will admit that in my day-to-day life I’m not always consciously thinking about how fortunate I have been with my access to education and the natural joy with which I approach reading. While I’m worrying about hitting my goal of reading 50 books this year, less than half of adults will read even one. Will the number of readers continue to drop?