I confess, when I was young it was not only OKAY to read books, but they were part of our school studies. We were encouraged to read everything.
Imagine that, we could read whatever we wanted.
And we did.
I remember books and the subsequent classroom discussions of them that had a huge impact on me. That made me THINK.
That is what the written word does. Makes you think.
Some of those books would never be in schools today. In Cold Blood. Catcher in the Rye. To Kill a Mockingbird. Of Mice and Men. Flowers for Algernon. Twelve Angry Men. Romeo and Juliet (Our teacher even took us to the theatre to watch Franco Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet, where, gasp, there was brief nudity).
The list is extensive. I was fortunate to have teachers not only present us with these, but discuss them as well, and let us decide for ourselves what we like or don’t like.
My parents had a huge library of books and none were off limits to me, from the day I could read. I read Benton’s Row. A Clockwork Orange. Valley of the Dolls. There were also lots of non-fiction in my house, Time Life Books, Reader’s Digest, National Geographic, and a plethora of physics, mechanics, biology.
At lunch time at school I used to read automotive mechanics. Can you imagine me doing that today?