16-07-2025
Where Have All the Novel-Reading Men Gone?
To the Editor:
I enjoyed 'Men Fade From a Literary Circle,' by Joseph Bernstein (Thursday Styles, July 3), about the decline in the number of men who read novels.
After graduation from college, while working in my first real job, I consumed 'Anna Karenina' in a beautiful marathon of reading; I worked all day, then drove home to read Tolstoy late into the night. I repeated that cycle again and again, devouring every word, happy but also sad because I knew the reverie could not last.
Mr. Bernstein offers that men have stopped reading novels, but it is not only men. I try to interest my nieces in novels. I explain to them that fiction contains the distilled experiences of other people.
You may never be a secret agent posted to Havana, but you can imagine what it would be like in 'Our Man in Havana.' You may never create life and be forced to live with the consequences, but you can imagine what it would be like in 'Frankenstein.'
Stuart GallantBelmont, Mass.
To the Editor:
Joseph Bernstein's article resonated with me, but failed to reach the next step of why men should be reading more fiction. Fiction allows us to step into others' shoes, enabling us to understand how they feel (emotional intelligence) and why they make the decisions they make (cognitive empathy).
As a 20-something woman, I've had the 'book genre conversation' with heterosexual men around my age, but many brush over it and don't acknowledge what there is to be gained from reading fiction.
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