WHY DO WE READ?

CARL WOODWARD refer to books as “the

instruments for perpetuating the body of knowledge
painfully and slowly accumulated through the ages of
man. They are also the means of preserving and
sustaining the solid foundations of culture and
learning. They provide the record of man’s progress
and the point of departure for steps in the future.
Through them the resources of mankind become the
birthright of generations to come.
 Books and other reading materials proliferate that
many often take them for granted. Many people have
yet to realize the rewards that reading has to offer.
It is through the magic of reading that all the wisdom
of the ages, all the stories that have delighted
mankind for centuries are available at neglible cost.
Reading is worth one’s effort, worth the little
expenses it may entail if any.
 Specifically, these are some of the important
things that reading does for us:
1. Reading makes us well-informed. It is a means of
gaining access to various areas of knowledge.
Through reading we learn the mistakes of the men
before us and learn some recipes for human success.
Books tell us how to be happy when sad, how to grow
plants, repair machines, build houses, lose our
wrinkles and keep young.
2. Reading can be a worthwhile form of recreation. It is
fun to read. Bennet Cerf once said that “the most
unfortunate people in the world are those who have
never learned the soul-satisfying pleasure of reading
good books.” (Stefferud 1962)
3. Books we read can be a source of inspiration. The
vision of the better-yet-to-be is the stuff of inspiration.
Given this vision, our lives lived under the light of
distant stars, foreseeing upon our present
workmanship the judgement of future generations.
The man of imagination ”has already tasted the bliss
of every heaven and felt the pang of every hell.”
Inspiration leads us to put our energies to full
account.
4. Reading can be a form of therapy. Books furnish us a
form of sublimation. There are times when things in
the world are too much to bear and we need a
grievance drainage. Sublimation is a way of draining-
off, of our malevolence upon substitute objects. And
what a world of substitute objects books provide! The
villain in a novel gives you somebody “ to shout at.”
One can enjoy divorce by proxy in a novel and needs
not go through the real court proceedings.