Is Reading Obsolete?

May 18, 2012, by

In a 2009 report on reading and literacy (Reading on the Rise), the National Endowment for the Arts found that “for the first time in more than 25 years, American adults are reading more literature… This growth reverses two decades of downward trends cited previously in NEA reports such as Reading at Risk and To Read or Not To Read.” Are American’s children in sync with the adult trend towards reading more literature?   At our recent strategic planning retreat, several Inprint Board members expressed concern that their children’s peers are not readers. Certainly, kids today encounter narrative through video and games to a much greater extent than I did growing up, or even 30-year-olds did. Have these forms of interactive narrative replaced reading a good book? Continue reading

Antena Books—Houston’s Newest Literary Space

May 14, 2012, by

When I think of literary spaces I think of bookstores, libraries, my favorite reading chair, or my desk, where I have sat with my laptop for hours in hopes of writing the perfect sentence, the perfect essay, or the perfect piece of literature that I naively daydream will live on for generations. Literary spaces are important, they inspire us to read, they inspire us to write, they celebrate the literary life in us, and they make public something that is a solitary act. We are lucky that Houston has vibrant literary spaces—we have some great independent bookstores and we have libraries which entice the young and old.

The newest, and perhaps most innovative literary space I have seen in Houston recently, is Antena Books/Libros Antena, a literary installation at Project Row Houses that is the creation of Houston writer and former Inprint blogger John Pluecker (or JP as his good friends call him). Continue reading