READING
FREDERICO ROCHAFERREIRA
Membro da Oxford Philosophical Society e do Institute of Philosophy
THE IMPORTANCE OF READING
Por Frederico Rochaferreira
There are many customs that can be described and exemplified as being detrimental to the development of a society and one of these customs is the habit of reading useless adopted by Brazilian society.
In the USA, for example, Americans take deep pride in their many bookstores, as do European societies and some societies in Asia. In South America, we have Argentina as the country with the largest number of bookstores in the world, an inheritance of European immigration at the end of the 19th century; If the number of bookstores does not signify the development of a nation, at least we can say; Which means the possibility of development, because development is a set of factors that begins with early childhood education and has its apex in higher education, therefore, it is a chain of education and education and should be of the highest quality, however are the bookstores ; The thermometer of this chain.
So when we look at Brazil and see Rio de Janeiro, one of the main capitals, with 5 bookstores for each 100 thousand inhabitants and São Paulo with 3, 5 bookstores for each 100 thousand inhabitants, we find by this thermometer, very low temperatures in the Development.
On the other hand, pharmacies and bars around here have long proliferated. We can almost say that in every corner there is always waiting for us a bar or a pharmacy and then we find that the trade of drinks and medicines, is a great deal. Faced with this picture; An unflattering mind, could say; That we are an alcoholic people, a sick people and an uncultured people, if we understand that bookstores are a trade of culture.
Now there is a portion of the population that knows how to read, but when it reads it reads very poorly, few are those who pass from prose, because prose and verse is the literary genre that predominates in the country, of course when I speak of prose; Is the literary prose to which I refer, where the story, the novel and the poetry are contained.
By that I mean; That a people who spend their existence producing tales of the old man, reading tales of the old man or listening to and seeing tales of the old man, will be; Surely atrophying their thoughts and their imagination and will have many difficulties in developing their own ideas, being limited to just assimilating ideas and a people who only assimilate ideas and not create them will always be a spectator, consumer when they can; Of old and new practices, of old and new inventions, of old and new technologies, and is thus destined to remain always on the margins of development.
