Affection for fiction

Philip Hensher in an interview in The Guardian today speaks of his unshakeable affection for fiction: "It allows us to see the world from the point of view of someone else and there has been quite a lot of neurological research that shows reading novels is actually good for you. It embeds you in society and makes you think about other people. People are certainly better at all sorts of things if they can hold a novel in their heads. It is quite a skill, but if you can't do it then you're missing out on something in life. I think you can tell, when you meet someone, whether they read novels or not. There is some little hollowness if they don't."

Why read?

A centre recently opened at the University of Liverpool with just this question in mind: The Centre for Research into Reading, Information and Linguistic Systems. The Director is Prof Philip Davis, editor of The Reader magazine, and the Centre will research the impact of reading on health--it looks at the effects of shared reading, reading in prisons, the role of reading in treating mental illness and much more besides. We look forward to following its progress.