There perhaps is something in here, although the column itself is rather glib. My reading life started first with comics, then I found Tolkien and at some point I found the cool intellectual writers of the past like Camus, Sartre, Bukowski, Salinger, Genet, Burroughs etc. I found my own world in the written text, a place where I could be alone removed from the expectations of the society and my peers. I think I could not find a community amongst other kids so I found it amongst characters in novels.

I assume kids like I used to be still wield their library card like a stiletto in their lone war against the world, but surely this is not and cannot be the pnly pathway to reading and to the world of literature. Perhaps one should search a model for luring kids to read somewhere else than in us drama kids.