Many of those I interact with about books through this project, both virtually and at my Incomprehension Workshops, are young people. Even now, all these years after I set out to read the world, I sometimes find my inbox flooded with messages from students whose teacher has asked them to write to me recommending a story. A while ago, I received a wonderful video from a young boy in Beijing advising me to read a book that explained why tomatoes can sometimes be quite dangerous.
Statistics bear out the enthusiasm for reading internationally that I’ve seen among the young: according to data compiled by Nielsen for the Booker Prize Foundation, ‘book buyers under the age of 35 account for almost half (48.2%) of all translated fiction purchases in the UK‘.
So it was a delight to be invited to contribute an essay to a new collection celebrating the importance and joy of reading for children and young people. The Gifts of Reading for the Next Generation is the second such anthology put together by editor Jennie Orchard. Like the first volume, The Gifts of Reading, it was inspired by an essay by the UK nature writer and scholar Robert Macfarlane, who wrote the foreword to this new collection.
Other contributors include such household names as William Boyd, Michael Morpurgo, Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai, Imtiaz Dharker and Horatio Clare, and all royalties go to Room to Read and U-Go. Founded by John Wood, these organisations promote literacy and education for girls and women. Indeed, U-Go’s aim is to fund the university education of 100,000 young women in the world’s lowest income countries.
We celebrated the UK publication of The Gifts of Reading for the Next Generation with a launch at London’s Daunt Bookshop. Also published in the US and Australia, the collection is widely available. BUT I have one copy that I am happy to sign and send anywhere in the world. If you’d like it, simply leave a comment below telling me about a book you gave or received that was important to you.
Looking forward to hearing your stories!
Photos © Amber Melody