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"And So It Goes"

Welcome to the fifth installment of my column as well as the start of (cue the drum roll) …. Year Two! As you have read elsewhere, BJ has big plans going forward and I am very happy to be part of things. If you remember I mentioned last time, the backlog I have directly because of this site is incredible and BJ's backlog of stories is even more immense. The marketplace of ideas has responded very positively which is very gratifying.

And we owe it to you—the reader. Thank you. Saying it does not begin to cover it but it bares repeating. Thank you. Without readers, without folks such as yourself making a point of reading this zine, we never would have made it this far. And because of you—the reader—we are able to continue doing what we love to do. Not only writing, but reading as well. This is something that makes the news of a recent poll very disheartening.

According to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll (Tuesday, August 21, 2007) that managed to survey a whopping 1,003 adults by phone, one in four Americans doesn't read books. I have to admit I never took statistics in High School or College, flunked Accounting in College more than once (I should have know better considering my issue with checkbooks) and pretty much have no mathematical ability, talent or inclination. The folks that did the poll claim they can extrapolate the results to the rest of the US population. Maybe they can. I don't know, though it does seem that having a sample size of one thousand people is a bit small to say the least. But, for the sake of argument, let's say they can and the poll accurately reflects the fact that one of four Americans doesn't read books.

That is appalling news. News that could have real implications about our society. Something that seemed to miss the point with a lot of the media coverage of the issue.

As expected, the talking heads on Cable and elsewhere were available to say that the poll meant liberals didn't read, conservatives didn't read, or anything else they could spin to benefit one party or another. I didn't care about any of that. What struck me was that if the poll results were accurate and could be stretched to cover the entire American population, things were very bad.

Could this be why quite a number of publishers, book stores, and small presses seem to be on the verge of collapse?

Could this be why the midlist is dying?

Could this be why publishers seem to be looking for cookie cutter books?

Is this why newspapers are failing across the country?

Could this be why Dan Brown was/is so successful?

Okay, the last one is a bit of a joke but one does wonder. Is it not the fault of bad economic decisions and instead, the fault of a significant part of the public that doesn't read?

Is this why voting levels continue to go down, reality television thrives, and newspapers are dumbing down their content? Could a large part of our problems be solved by getting the other twenty-five percent of our population onboard the reading bandwagon?

I don't know but one wonders if there is a link here.

The idea that twenty-five percent of our population is not reading is absolutely horrifying to me. It isn't that I care whether they are reading conservative books, liberal books, fiction, non-fiction or any of the other many groups that are out there. I don't care what folks are reading.

I do care that theoretically twenty-five percent of our population isn't reading books—of any kind. Assuming they all aren't disgruntled loners living in their Mom's basement plotting revenge killing sprees, that means there are a lot of folks who aren't reading in front of their kids, talking about books to their coworkers, and quite possibly staying engaged with society and the world around them. Sure, it's easy to over simply but it is possible. Despite all the hype about reading clubs, Oprah's influence on the written word, and all the rest of it, the survey numbers seem to have remained unchanged no matter which group is conducting the survey.

Which is just downright sad. I realize I am preaching to the congregation here and no, I have no easy answers. It does seem to me that regardless of where you fall in the political spectrum this sort of thing matters. It very well could be having a huge impact on not just the big stuff like wars and that sort of thing, but little stuff close to home like the newspaper in your town and keeping folks employed at the bookstore down the street.

Reading is important. Period.