Essay on Reading

Reading, as important an activity as it is, is often neglected by many on their day to day lives. Being myself guilty of such far too often, it’s refreshing to read a collection of articles that tries to challenge one out of their apathy and into becoming better readers. While reading these articles, I learned much about reading, thinking, and writing; and that is the joy in reading, it makes me understand it better, and I can relate to some of the struggles the characters were going through. Sometimes I wish I were more interested in activities that are good for me, for example, reading books. I do like some books, but when it gets a little boring, I completely lose focus and struggle to concentrate again. In the article, “The Lonely Good Company of Books,” the character states that he trembles when he comes upon whole shelves of books he has not read. He finds so much joy in reading and I hope I am like that too one day. After reading all of these articles, I can understand everything a little better. They gave tips on how to be an affectionate reader and writer with tips and steps, even on how to learn more like the article, “Why Do American Kids Learn So Little?,” by Ernest Van Dan Haag. He says that American children learn far less in school than European and Japanese children do. For some reason, I kind of agree with it. Every time I travel out of the country, people seem to know more than the kids here do. I didn’t know the reason for that until reading the articles.
When you are reading, but really reading between lines, you make connection with the text and relate to the struggles. In “The Lonely, Good Company of Books” by Richard Rodriguez, I relate to him because at first, when he was younger, his parents would always tell him not to write on books, and that’s just like me. I never wrote on them because it would look messy and I didn’t like that at all, but now I am trying to change my ways and learn how to write on it because I know it will help