Why is reading good for you – Term Paper

Why you should read

Having the power to read and write is one of the most outstanding skills a person acquires thanks to education. However, today, the introduction of the technology has threatened to erode the book lovers and take away the precious time one has when reading. It is more difficult for people watching movies to be creative and imaginative as opposed to those reading books since the television paints the pictures. This dependency has led to the situation when today’s youth is barely able to be creative. While televisions and movies play a crucial role in entertaining and informing, books have the dominant role in developing the brain by allowing readers to form a personal from the words that create a page of a book. Thus, reading books is an important exercise one should always embrace regardless of age. This essay is going to focus on the major benefits of reading books.  My three body paragraphs on the benefit of reading books are going to be based on the readings from Laughing without Accent, Down and Out in Providence, and Our Twisted Hero.

The Three Benefits of Reading

According to the book Laughing without accent, the first reason to read is because it helps the reader understand various societies. Dumas (209) is quoted to have said;

They thought I was a winner. I did not realize it at the time but those women and those delicious little dumplings they used to bring, were the only things that kept me from total despair. In addition, to think that I had volunteered to help them. There are reasons why people get hooked on volunteering. It feels good and it is not illegal, immoral, or fattening – although I believe, the dumplings were. 

 The quote by Dumas clearly figures out the audience position in relation to understanding another culture. The reader is introduced to the narrator world, where the narrator manages to share her naivety. What is easily understood is the uncertainty, and lack of the appropriate discovery of information that the reader has. Hence, one would agree with Dumas (209) who claims that some books can teach you how to build shelves, catch trout, or cook couscous. They can tell you what life in China was like two thousand years ago. These books can make one laugh, cry, think or just relax.  Raising questions over the occurrence of a given behavior existing within the current society cannot be addressed through reading since many people no longer seek knowledge from the books, thus leading to the erosion of culture and belief.  After a reader analyzes the book further, s/he creates a picture of the illusive world, if the whole painting is done for oneself as seen in the movie. This enables the reader with a chance to become develop constructive and abstractive thinking. 

In Down and Out in Providence, another reason for reading is explained which consists in an opportunity to develop, refine and sharpen one’s beliefs. Wolf  indicates when one reads books; the publication becomes an experience where one can think over and criticize ideas that may differ from what s/he believes in. As quoted from Wolf (122)

Love isn’t hugging and kissing’, she says, “it’s taking off your jacket in the cold weather, and Wanda letting’ me sit on her and its Florence keeping’ me warm, and that girl given me her coat and Wanda just about carrying me to the elevator. God, I’ll never forget any of ya. That’s what love is.”

This is a clear scenario where an author uses the publication to express his or her feelings towards the society. Supportively, Wolf (123) argues that people say we should pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, but these folks who may not have bootstraps or other resources can pull you up their sheer guts and integrity. While combined, the text presents an important enriching material why reading is important. The text reaffirms that reading helps to develop, refine and sharpen one’s beliefs. 

The third reason why reading is important is the ability to keep the history of the past. In the book Our Twisted Hero history is well remembered for writing. If the information is recorded without exaggeration, it provides the knowledge to the reader on the accounts that took place in the past (Yi and O’Rourke 102). Large volumes of works by the authors show the ability of the storage of information that either is based on one’s experience or has taken place, thus giving light to the need to acquire the knowledge concerning the past. History is educative as claimed in the book. For instance, by reading about the events of the civil wars and their major consequences, the reader becomes enlightened and can avoid such experiences by preventing the recurrence in the future. This is important since one can control any similar or close cause of the outbreak of war, thus ending up saving the life of another person. Therefore, it is effective to read books and get more knowledge on the history given by the author.

In conclusion, reading books are essential as they have the power to make one intelligent, rationale, and creative. Books make people test, refine and sharpen personal beliefs against others, and they become important sources of information in telling the history. These three books have provided a ground for which I was unable to stand and figure out the need to turn to books and that they are much better to use when on free time as opposed to watching televisions, movies, and films.

Works Cited

Dumas, Firoozeh. Laughing Without an Accent : Adventures of an Iranian American, at Home and Abroad. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2009. 

Wolf, Geralyn. Down and out in Providence : Seeing Christianity through New Eyes. New York: Crossroad, 2004. 

Yi, Mun-yol and Kevin O’Rourke. Our Twisted Hero. New York : Hyperion East, 2001.