A couple decades ago and change, I used to finish 2-3 books a week. I’d go to the library, get some books, read ‘em, and go back for more. Sometimes I’d splurge and go to a bookstore, though I could rarely afford to.
And then came The Internet.
I’ve scrolled through I don’t know how many thousands of miles of text on computers and phones. Articles. Blog posts and comments. Long-gone forums. Tweets. Reddit threads. Facebook updates. Endless ephemeral stuff. The draw was that it seemed current, now, connected, plugged-in.
And then things changed again, and now I’m finishing about 2-3 books every week.
The more time I spend reading paper books, the more the internet loses its appeal. But it also goes the other direction; more time spent online makes books seem stodgier, less relevant, more remote.
It’s like my brain has two different modes, and it’s hard to cycle rapidly between them. One or the other will gain the upper hand.
Book Mode comes online slowly, determinedly, and feels satisfying and “clean” once engaged. Internet Mode is repulsive at first, but then a swift slippery slide into the oozingly comforting embrace of slick conductive mud.
I think the internet offers the quick hit of dopamine that sort of mirrors what you get from reading something of substance. Much like junk food or alcohol sort of gives you a facsimile of actual satisfaction. You know that eating well or abstaining from drinking will in the long run lead to a better and more fulfilling existence, but the pull of instant gratification and cheap highs can keep you going in the wrong direction far longer than we’d like to admit.
Have you ever picked up a book by Evola? I spent my time on the classics in my early twenties, Crime and Punishment was one of them, but they all seemed to be prepping me for genuine metaphysic authors (which I found out about online, no way bookshops would ever sell them). If you've got the concentration necessary for Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, Evola or Guénon is the next step up and out of the noosphere.
"I picked up Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment a year ago, got about a chapter in and then set it down for six months. I tried again and made slightly more progress before once again setting it down."
The story of Raskolnikov, however well-written, isn't ever going to be thrilling reading. At least IMO. My suggestion would be, you need to get into the habit of reading again. And to do that, you should try to find some really exciting books that you can't put down. Russian literature or deep themes be damned, it just needs to be a good story. Start from a solid base of JUST reading, then move onto the heavier stuff.
If you like Sci-fi I just read Leviathan awakes and that was pretty damn good. Can't Hurt Me was amazing non-fiction.
C&P starts a little slow, but if you’re halfway through you should be coming up on Part 4, which absolutely crackles with energy. It’s 90 or so pages of pure intensity and wholly justifies the road to get there.
Deep themes be damned? I would say first, you can’t argue matters of taste or inclination. What one likes, one likes. Second, ‘thrilling’ is just one form of pleasure or reward. There are others, obviously. And finally, a book itself is not an antidote to addiction. There’s the question of nutritional value. Junk is junk, whether ‘thrilling’ or ‘deep’, on a screen or off. The question is whether our reading habit is good for us or not. That’s for the reader to decide.
Agree. What I personally look for in a book is a sense of chest-expanding euphoria that comes with learning something new or delving into someone else's life, especially one so far removed from me. For example, a story by Dostoyevsky written in 1862 - I mean, that alone would make me shake in excitement.
I think it's not just the dopamine. I must say I read on the Internet, ruining my eyes, to try and keep up with the foreground and background political developments, with developments re pandemic fraud, injections fraud and progress of the biosecurity architecture. About what is being orchestrated and what do about it. Narratives and rabbit holes. I don't really have all that much fun doing this, but it has already paid off and I feel we do have to keep abreast of the sh... that they pulling off. One has to reserve time, maybe evenings, for long form reading. Maybe alternate evenings for internet and for books.
1. Goodreads and YouTube (among other social media) have a strong community of consistent readers. So the shrinking availability (and sometimes nonexistence) of bookstores doesn’t seem to match what I’m seeing. They can’t ALL be listen in g to audiobooks online or using tablets, can they?
2. The biggest supermarket chain here in Florida is called Publix. Every Publix in my area (about an hour north of Tampa) no longer sells ANY books. No bestsellers, nothing, just some magazines. It’s been that way since the second half of 2023, and they didn’t even carry any for Christmastime impulse buying. So books don’t sell at all in the supermarket anymore? Personally, I always check to see what they have, every single time I’m in the supermarket. I very rarely buy anything, but that’s a personal taste issue. But... nobody wants those books? How, why? When did this happen?
3. I am always in the middle of a book, and I have been since my teenage years. I’m 50 now. I read daily, even if it’s just a couple pages. Like I said before, I know there are a ton of readers like me and many many people who eclipse my reading volume. So what happened to the books and booksellers? Even the flea markets have dried up in recent years. It’s not for lack of books being printed, that’s for sure.
I can only assume that whatever physical books are still being sold must just be ordered online. B&N is all that’s left around here anyway and their selection is awful.
Sorry to hear that Publix no longer sells any books. As long as they continue offering subs I’ll still be going though.
Same. The culture is doing something to us. My godsons are very intelligent but don’t read physical books, and actually sort of despise them. My husband used to read a book a day and now reads none. Everybody is glued to their smartphone. This crap is severing our connection to our cultural past at the same time that the schools and universities are purging great art/ideas in favor of fashionable lies. And you’re right about the flattery angle: reading the great classics is humbling; reading some snarky blogger makes you feel, briefly, in-the-know. We need some serious self-discipline to step away from the all-you-can-eat tech buffet.
I should have added that screens are interactive in a way that books are not. You can post a comment, like/dislike, and make friends and enemies. It’s the global village that McLuhan foresaw and mistakenly identified with the non-interactive TV.
the same exact situation happened to me around 2012 with the smart phone.
I was a lifelong reader of many genres and then almost stopped overnight.
early last year, being quite disgusted with myself, I bought a small flip phone and put my iPhone 11 on the shelf. this came with it's own technical problems, but I ironed them out after a month or two.
I started with easier, more readable fare (for me it was Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove series of 4 book) and then moved on to some classics including Crime and Punishment! (well worth it.)
I won't drag this on, only to say that it is possible. I now use a desktop computer for all internet usage (still an addiction at time), but what was crucial was getting rid of my Smart Phone. I still use it to pay my bills sometimes and it's amazing how fast I get pulled in to its gaping maw. evil little black screen.
To me the shift seems less from paper to digital, from novels to articles, and more private to public. The public world seems to me an emotionless place whereas the private world has shadow and depth. Novels are part of that private world, website and Substack articles somehow not. Maybe that's why the latter aren't memorable.
This was me 2 months ago! Since then I have read 4 books & I’m 1/2 way through The Best Minds now. I forbid my teenagers to watch mindless trash on YouTube. I typically watch shows like Megyn Kelly or Glen Greenwalds show, so I don’t think it’s totally useless. But, it’s not “fun” or something I can call a hobby. I lost all hobbies! Not anymore. I put the phone down, I go to the library & get books to read. I’ve also taken up drawing/sketching. I’m enjoying my off time a lot more now. Even though, I respond to texts later than I use to.. I feel better.
“I have time. I have the ability. I even have an urge to return to that practice of constantly working my way through something that interested me. So why does the screeching nonsense from my phone have more pull?”
It’s frustrating, but I have been able to just force myself to read some trivial amount each day and it’s gotten easier to get back into it. A few days in it starts to feel more natural and you’ll read for longer stretches.
Since October I've been drastically restricting my internet use - using it only once a week and texting myself whatever I need to do on the internet (who directed that movie, is my 3 year old's behavior normal or autism, buy a new pair of sippers, etc). Exceptions for using maps, texting, emergencies, etc.
It really really helped. I got into the habit of reading again by re-reading favorites and then reading things I always wanted to read. It lasted until I picked up Little Women - I've never found that book interesting and I spent weeks not reading it because it was like a punishment. I also got into the habit of doing needlework again, which I've been so happy about.
Around Thanksgiving/December, I largely fell off the wagon because buying presents stresses me out and it was a genuine emergency to find gift guides to figure out what to get my kids. Then the kids and I got sick so I ended up caving and scrolling reddit while being a human mattress.
I know nothing about current events which makes me feel like a way better person. Played with my kids more, kept a cleaner house, was more relaxed. I listened to podcasts but stopped listening to the ones peddling outrage.
I'm going to recommit to staying off the internet next month until my baby's born.
I remember reading an article a few years ago that was discussing brain plasticity, and how technology is quite literally reducing our intelligence. The basic premise was that when you read an entire book, long lasting memory and neural pathways are established.
When you flit from screen to screen, post to post, topic to topic and comment to comment, these pathways are never developed.
I suspect that eventually they CAN'T be developed, without a radical change in behaviour.
This quick gratification/dopamine reward system is insidious.
It disrupts our neural circuitry, wastes inordinate amounts of our time resulting in us achieving vastly less than humans used to. And it acts as babysitter and pacifier.
There's good reason why people like Steve Jobs wouldn't allow his kids access to this technology.
You reminded me how I yearn for the return of those fabulous bookstores. As a kid, (this goes way back), every Friday night, the family would pile in the car to go to A Clean, Well Lighted Place for Books. How approximately named. It was one of the early upscale bookstores in the U.S. back then. My parents would let us graze on free range fiction. We would stay for hours. Finding the right book was just as good as the journey of discovery.
It has been my experience that non-readers need engagement through storytelling. I learned many new skills reading stories and eventually writing for my kids. Story time was a clear favorite. Doing voices, comic delivery, sound effects, etc. clearly invites listener participation. Libraries used to have well respected story hours - but not so much anymore.
Where can a girl and her family go to read and relax in a like-minded atmosphere with a great, heaping pile of books for sale? A university? Heaven forfend... A Books a Million? Not so much...
I fear for kids today. What I consider a bare minimum of wisdom and knowledge for kids goes well beyond the 2nd grade reading level. It’s up to readers to share their love of books and learning with others.
Since I have thousands of physical books, I may just start the first library in a small ranching community in Texas.
I have all my life been a massive reader, devouring books, and yes it ended with first the Internet (web browsing) and then with smartphones. I had a period where I compensated with Kindle - books on smartphones - but eventually that also petered out. I'm clinging on with audiobooks - on smartphone. It's more expensive but at least it's a proper book.
I have tried but find my mind wanders too much when it is in audio form. I end up having to backtrack constantly and get frustrated with it. Glad you’ve found something that works for you.
I’ve come to prefer non-fiction audiobooks to pass inevitable time that would just be wasted while driving, but I can’t do novels. As you say, the mind wanders. I think it’s because you have to have your imagination engaged to really enjoy fiction, and having engaged it, it goes in every direction.
May I ask where you get audiobooks? I tried and rejected Audible and my local library has a lot of audiobooks through their app but 95% of them are crappy genre fiction (romance, thrillers etc) that I am not interested in. They also seem to
rotate licensing so that TBR books that I painstakingly search up and add to my queue mysteriously disappear. Just wondering what else might be out there.
Yeah sorry I did mean Audible. I have experimented with some of the free and public domain audiobooks a little but I come back to Audible. I am lucky I can afford it and I don't listen to more than the one "free" book a month, if that.
A couple decades ago and change, I used to finish 2-3 books a week. I’d go to the library, get some books, read ‘em, and go back for more. Sometimes I’d splurge and go to a bookstore, though I could rarely afford to.
And then came The Internet.
I’ve scrolled through I don’t know how many thousands of miles of text on computers and phones. Articles. Blog posts and comments. Long-gone forums. Tweets. Reddit threads. Facebook updates. Endless ephemeral stuff. The draw was that it seemed current, now, connected, plugged-in.
And then things changed again, and now I’m finishing about 2-3 books every week.
The more time I spend reading paper books, the more the internet loses its appeal. But it also goes the other direction; more time spent online makes books seem stodgier, less relevant, more remote.
It’s like my brain has two different modes, and it’s hard to cycle rapidly between them. One or the other will gain the upper hand.
Book Mode comes online slowly, determinedly, and feels satisfying and “clean” once engaged. Internet Mode is repulsive at first, but then a swift slippery slide into the oozingly comforting embrace of slick conductive mud.
I think the internet offers the quick hit of dopamine that sort of mirrors what you get from reading something of substance. Much like junk food or alcohol sort of gives you a facsimile of actual satisfaction. You know that eating well or abstaining from drinking will in the long run lead to a better and more fulfilling existence, but the pull of instant gratification and cheap highs can keep you going in the wrong direction far longer than we’d like to admit.
Have you ever picked up a book by Evola? I spent my time on the classics in my early twenties, Crime and Punishment was one of them, but they all seemed to be prepping me for genuine metaphysic authors (which I found out about online, no way bookshops would ever sell them). If you've got the concentration necessary for Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, Evola or Guénon is the next step up and out of the noosphere.
For me, “substack” came.
It’s too easy to casually open something and find yourself scrolling again.
"I picked up Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment a year ago, got about a chapter in and then set it down for six months. I tried again and made slightly more progress before once again setting it down."
The story of Raskolnikov, however well-written, isn't ever going to be thrilling reading. At least IMO. My suggestion would be, you need to get into the habit of reading again. And to do that, you should try to find some really exciting books that you can't put down. Russian literature or deep themes be damned, it just needs to be a good story. Start from a solid base of JUST reading, then move onto the heavier stuff.
If you like Sci-fi I just read Leviathan awakes and that was pretty damn good. Can't Hurt Me was amazing non-fiction.
Build the habit!
Thanks for the suggestions! And I agree, it would probably be easier to ease back into the habit with something a little less demanding.
C&P starts a little slow, but if you’re halfway through you should be coming up on Part 4, which absolutely crackles with energy. It’s 90 or so pages of pure intensity and wholly justifies the road to get there.
Thank you for writing this!
I agree, it was a little bit of a slow burn at first but it keeps ramping up. I will definitely finish it soon.
I’m in a similar position as you, but Leviathan Wakes (and the rest of the Expanse series) definitely helped.
It is a cool series. Have you read the Dark Forest trilogy? Mind blowing
Deep themes be damned? I would say first, you can’t argue matters of taste or inclination. What one likes, one likes. Second, ‘thrilling’ is just one form of pleasure or reward. There are others, obviously. And finally, a book itself is not an antidote to addiction. There’s the question of nutritional value. Junk is junk, whether ‘thrilling’ or ‘deep’, on a screen or off. The question is whether our reading habit is good for us or not. That’s for the reader to decide.
Agree. What I personally look for in a book is a sense of chest-expanding euphoria that comes with learning something new or delving into someone else's life, especially one so far removed from me. For example, a story by Dostoyevsky written in 1862 - I mean, that alone would make me shake in excitement.
I liked Project Hail Mary. The one sci-fi novel I read in 2023
This is my experience too and I’m also trying to be better but here I am on substack instead of reading my novel sitting next to me.
I think it's not just the dopamine. I must say I read on the Internet, ruining my eyes, to try and keep up with the foreground and background political developments, with developments re pandemic fraud, injections fraud and progress of the biosecurity architecture. About what is being orchestrated and what do about it. Narratives and rabbit holes. I don't really have all that much fun doing this, but it has already paid off and I feel we do have to keep abreast of the sh... that they pulling off. One has to reserve time, maybe evenings, for long form reading. Maybe alternate evenings for internet and for books.
I have a tendency to get sucked into rabbit holes in the same way. I think your alternating schedule idea is a good one.
Precisely this.
My thousands of hours of research into the covid scam has been more useful to the health of me and my family than reading Dostoyevsky.
Gotta keep the soul healthy as well as the body. Man does not live by bread alone...
I could talk about this for hours. Three things:
1. Goodreads and YouTube (among other social media) have a strong community of consistent readers. So the shrinking availability (and sometimes nonexistence) of bookstores doesn’t seem to match what I’m seeing. They can’t ALL be listen in g to audiobooks online or using tablets, can they?
2. The biggest supermarket chain here in Florida is called Publix. Every Publix in my area (about an hour north of Tampa) no longer sells ANY books. No bestsellers, nothing, just some magazines. It’s been that way since the second half of 2023, and they didn’t even carry any for Christmastime impulse buying. So books don’t sell at all in the supermarket anymore? Personally, I always check to see what they have, every single time I’m in the supermarket. I very rarely buy anything, but that’s a personal taste issue. But... nobody wants those books? How, why? When did this happen?
3. I am always in the middle of a book, and I have been since my teenage years. I’m 50 now. I read daily, even if it’s just a couple pages. Like I said before, I know there are a ton of readers like me and many many people who eclipse my reading volume. So what happened to the books and booksellers? Even the flea markets have dried up in recent years. It’s not for lack of books being printed, that’s for sure.
I can only assume that whatever physical books are still being sold must just be ordered online. B&N is all that’s left around here anyway and their selection is awful.
Sorry to hear that Publix no longer sells any books. As long as they continue offering subs I’ll still be going though.
Same. The culture is doing something to us. My godsons are very intelligent but don’t read physical books, and actually sort of despise them. My husband used to read a book a day and now reads none. Everybody is glued to their smartphone. This crap is severing our connection to our cultural past at the same time that the schools and universities are purging great art/ideas in favor of fashionable lies. And you’re right about the flattery angle: reading the great classics is humbling; reading some snarky blogger makes you feel, briefly, in-the-know. We need some serious self-discipline to step away from the all-you-can-eat tech buffet.
I should have added that screens are interactive in a way that books are not. You can post a comment, like/dislike, and make friends and enemies. It’s the global village that McLuhan foresaw and mistakenly identified with the non-interactive TV.
When reading you are interacting privately and often deeply with the author.
the same exact situation happened to me around 2012 with the smart phone.
I was a lifelong reader of many genres and then almost stopped overnight.
early last year, being quite disgusted with myself, I bought a small flip phone and put my iPhone 11 on the shelf. this came with it's own technical problems, but I ironed them out after a month or two.
I started with easier, more readable fare (for me it was Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove series of 4 book) and then moved on to some classics including Crime and Punishment! (well worth it.)
I won't drag this on, only to say that it is possible. I now use a desktop computer for all internet usage (still an addiction at time), but what was crucial was getting rid of my Smart Phone. I still use it to pay my bills sometimes and it's amazing how fast I get pulled in to its gaping maw. evil little black screen.
kill yer Smart Phone.
get out while ya can...
Demon slab... I do try to keep my internet use confined to my laptop as much as possible.
To me the shift seems less from paper to digital, from novels to articles, and more private to public. The public world seems to me an emotionless place whereas the private world has shadow and depth. Novels are part of that private world, website and Substack articles somehow not. Maybe that's why the latter aren't memorable.
There is definitely something to that. A lack of intimacy, or a shadow and depth, as you said, that leaves a more lasting impression.
To be fair a lot of Substack articles in my opinion have more shadow, depth, and intimate warmth than most internet "content."
This was me 2 months ago! Since then I have read 4 books & I’m 1/2 way through The Best Minds now. I forbid my teenagers to watch mindless trash on YouTube. I typically watch shows like Megyn Kelly or Glen Greenwalds show, so I don’t think it’s totally useless. But, it’s not “fun” or something I can call a hobby. I lost all hobbies! Not anymore. I put the phone down, I go to the library & get books to read. I’ve also taken up drawing/sketching. I’m enjoying my off time a lot more now. Even though, I respond to texts later than I use to.. I feel better.
Awesome to hear! That’s the kind of energy/attitude I’m trying to get back to as well
As a librarian, I thoroughly approve.
“I have time. I have the ability. I even have an urge to return to that practice of constantly working my way through something that interested me. So why does the screeching nonsense from my phone have more pull?”
This is so relatable it physically hurts
Yep. Same. I hate it, and I don’t know what to do about it.
It’s frustrating, but I have been able to just force myself to read some trivial amount each day and it’s gotten easier to get back into it. A few days in it starts to feel more natural and you’ll read for longer stretches.
Since October I've been drastically restricting my internet use - using it only once a week and texting myself whatever I need to do on the internet (who directed that movie, is my 3 year old's behavior normal or autism, buy a new pair of sippers, etc). Exceptions for using maps, texting, emergencies, etc.
It really really helped. I got into the habit of reading again by re-reading favorites and then reading things I always wanted to read. It lasted until I picked up Little Women - I've never found that book interesting and I spent weeks not reading it because it was like a punishment. I also got into the habit of doing needlework again, which I've been so happy about.
Around Thanksgiving/December, I largely fell off the wagon because buying presents stresses me out and it was a genuine emergency to find gift guides to figure out what to get my kids. Then the kids and I got sick so I ended up caving and scrolling reddit while being a human mattress.
I know nothing about current events which makes me feel like a way better person. Played with my kids more, kept a cleaner house, was more relaxed. I listened to podcasts but stopped listening to the ones peddling outrage.
I'm going to recommit to staying off the internet next month until my baby's born.
Sounds like you’ve found the right balance. This is the type of relationship I’m shooting for with screen/internet usage.
I remember reading an article a few years ago that was discussing brain plasticity, and how technology is quite literally reducing our intelligence. The basic premise was that when you read an entire book, long lasting memory and neural pathways are established.
When you flit from screen to screen, post to post, topic to topic and comment to comment, these pathways are never developed.
I suspect that eventually they CAN'T be developed, without a radical change in behaviour.
This quick gratification/dopamine reward system is insidious.
It disrupts our neural circuitry, wastes inordinate amounts of our time resulting in us achieving vastly less than humans used to. And it acts as babysitter and pacifier.
There's good reason why people like Steve Jobs wouldn't allow his kids access to this technology.
It's Ambien for the masses.
You reminded me how I yearn for the return of those fabulous bookstores. As a kid, (this goes way back), every Friday night, the family would pile in the car to go to A Clean, Well Lighted Place for Books. How approximately named. It was one of the early upscale bookstores in the U.S. back then. My parents would let us graze on free range fiction. We would stay for hours. Finding the right book was just as good as the journey of discovery.
It has been my experience that non-readers need engagement through storytelling. I learned many new skills reading stories and eventually writing for my kids. Story time was a clear favorite. Doing voices, comic delivery, sound effects, etc. clearly invites listener participation. Libraries used to have well respected story hours - but not so much anymore.
Where can a girl and her family go to read and relax in a like-minded atmosphere with a great, heaping pile of books for sale? A university? Heaven forfend... A Books a Million? Not so much...
I fear for kids today. What I consider a bare minimum of wisdom and knowledge for kids goes well beyond the 2nd grade reading level. It’s up to readers to share their love of books and learning with others.
Since I have thousands of physical books, I may just start the first library in a small ranching community in Texas.
Thank you for the wonderful walk through time.
Wonderful reminiscence
I have all my life been a massive reader, devouring books, and yes it ended with first the Internet (web browsing) and then with smartphones. I had a period where I compensated with Kindle - books on smartphones - but eventually that also petered out. I'm clinging on with audiobooks - on smartphone. It's more expensive but at least it's a proper book.
I have tried but find my mind wanders too much when it is in audio form. I end up having to backtrack constantly and get frustrated with it. Glad you’ve found something that works for you.
I’ve come to prefer non-fiction audiobooks to pass inevitable time that would just be wasted while driving, but I can’t do novels. As you say, the mind wanders. I think it’s because you have to have your imagination engaged to really enjoy fiction, and having engaged it, it goes in every direction.
Never thought about that as the reason but it makes perfect sense!
May I ask where you get audiobooks? I tried and rejected Audible and my local library has a lot of audiobooks through their app but 95% of them are crappy genre fiction (romance, thrillers etc) that I am not interested in. They also seem to
rotate licensing so that TBR books that I painstakingly search up and add to my queue mysteriously disappear. Just wondering what else might be out there.
I find better books on Hoopla than Libby, both are “local library”.
Yeah sorry I did mean Audible. I have experimented with some of the free and public domain audiobooks a little but I come back to Audible. I am lucky I can afford it and I don't listen to more than the one "free" book a month, if that.