The decline in reading and what it costs us

Reading gives us far more than entertainment

Main reading room, Cleveland Public library. Photo by Mark Souther, Creative Commons license.

As a child, I loved going to the library. On Saturdays, my father would bring me there, deposit me in the children’s section, and then go off to find his own books. There I was alone, without any adult supervision, amidst a landscape of books—it was thrilling. T…