words on the page. Only a small portion of the brain devoted to processing written language is activated during reading, while games engage the full range of the sensory and motor cortices.
Books are also tragically isolating. While games have for many years engaged the young in complex social relationships with their peers, building and exploring worlds together, books force the child to sequester him or herself in a quiet space, shut off from interaction with other children. These new âlibrariesâ that have arisen in recent years to facilitate reading activities are a frightening sight: dozens of young children, normally so vivacious and socially interactive, sitting alone in cubicles, reading silently, oblivious to their peers.
Many children enjoy reading books, of course, and no doubt some of the flights of fancy conveyed by reading have their escapist merits. But for a sizable percentage of the population, books are downright discriminatory. The reading craze of recent years cruelly taunts the 10 million Americans who suffer from dyslexiaâa condition that didnât even exist as a condition until printed text came along to stigmatize its sufferers.
But perhaps the most dangerous property of these books is the fact that they follow a fixed linear path. You canât control their narratives in any fashionâyou simply sit back and have the story dictated to you. For those of us raised on interactive narratives, this property may seem astonishing. Why would anyone want to embark on an adventure utterly choreographed by another person? But todayâs generation embarks on such adventures millions of times a day. This risks instilling a general passivity in our children, making them feel as though theyâre powerless to change their circumstances. Reading is not an active, participatory process; itâs a submissive one. The book readers of the younger generation are learning to âfollow the plotâ instead of learning to lead.
It should probably go without saying, but it probably goes better with saying, that I donât agree with this argument. But neither is it exactly right to say that its contentions are untrue. The argument relies on a kind of amplified selectivity: it foregrounds certain isolated properties of books, and then projects worst-case scenarios based on these properties and their potential effects on the âyounger generation.â But it doesnât bring up any of the clear benefits of reading: the complexity of argument and storytelling offered by the book form; the stretching of the imagination triggered by reading words on a page; the shared experience you get when everyone is reading the same story.
A comparable sleight of hand is at work anytime you hear someone bemoaning todayâs video game obsessions, and their stupefying effects on tomorrowâs generations. Games are not novels, and the ways in which they harbor novelistic aspirations are invariably the least interesting thing about them. You can judge games by the criteria designed to evaluate novels: Are the characters believable? Is the dialogue complex? But inevitably, the games will come up wanting. Games are good at novelistic storytelling the way Michael Jordan was good at playing baseball. Both could probably make a living at it, but their world-class talents lie elsewhere.
Before we get to those talents, let me say a few words about the virtues of reading books. For the record, I think those virtues are immense onesâand not just because I make a living writing books. We should all encourage our kids to read more, to develop a comfort with and an appetite for reading. But even the most avid reader in this culture is invariably going to spend his or her time with other mediaâwith games, television, movies, or the Internet. And these other forms of culture have intellectual or cognitive virtues in their own rightâdifferent from, but comparable to, the rewards of
Books are also tragically isolating. While games have for many years engaged the young in complex social relationships with their peers, building and exploring worlds together, books force the child to sequester him or herself in a quiet space, shut off from interaction with other children. These new âlibrariesâ that have arisen in recent years to facilitate reading activities are a frightening sight: dozens of young children, normally so vivacious and socially interactive, sitting alone in cubicles, reading silently, oblivious to their peers.
Many children enjoy reading books, of course, and no doubt some of the flights of fancy conveyed by reading have their escapist merits. But for a sizable percentage of the population, books are downright discriminatory. The reading craze of recent years cruelly taunts the 10 million Americans who suffer from dyslexiaâa condition that didnât even exist as a condition until printed text came along to stigmatize its sufferers.
But perhaps the most dangerous property of these books is the fact that they follow a fixed linear path. You canât control their narratives in any fashionâyou simply sit back and have the story dictated to you. For those of us raised on interactive narratives, this property may seem astonishing. Why would anyone want to embark on an adventure utterly choreographed by another person? But todayâs generation embarks on such adventures millions of times a day. This risks instilling a general passivity in our children, making them feel as though theyâre powerless to change their circumstances. Reading is not an active, participatory process; itâs a submissive one. The book readers of the younger generation are learning to âfollow the plotâ instead of learning to lead.
It should probably go without saying, but it probably goes better with saying, that I donât agree with this argument. But neither is it exactly right to say that its contentions are untrue. The argument relies on a kind of amplified selectivity: it foregrounds certain isolated properties of books, and then projects worst-case scenarios based on these properties and their potential effects on the âyounger generation.â But it doesnât bring up any of the clear benefits of reading: the complexity of argument and storytelling offered by the book form; the stretching of the imagination triggered by reading words on a page; the shared experience you get when everyone is reading the same story.
A comparable sleight of hand is at work anytime you hear someone bemoaning todayâs video game obsessions, and their stupefying effects on tomorrowâs generations. Games are not novels, and the ways in which they harbor novelistic aspirations are invariably the least interesting thing about them. You can judge games by the criteria designed to evaluate novels: Are the characters believable? Is the dialogue complex? But inevitably, the games will come up wanting. Games are good at novelistic storytelling the way Michael Jordan was good at playing baseball. Both could probably make a living at it, but their world-class talents lie elsewhere.
Before we get to those talents, let me say a few words about the virtues of reading books. For the record, I think those virtues are immense onesâand not just because I make a living writing books. We should all encourage our kids to read more, to develop a comfort with and an appetite for reading. But even the most avid reader in this culture is invariably going to spend his or her time with other mediaâwith games, television, movies, or the Internet. And these other forms of culture have intellectual or cognitive virtues in their own rightâdifferent from, but comparable to, the rewards of
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