Faveread: Ursula Le Guin on publishing & reading

I have decided to create a new series here called "Faveread" of, as the title suggests, my favorite reads -- things I had to read to the end even though I don't have the time. This will not be a weekly column or anything because I don't need the additional pressure of yet another deadline ;-)

I start off this series with an article from February 2008 (you see, it's what I recently read, not what was recently published) by Ursula Le Guin (who, I believe, was a writer in residence at Tulane while I was an undergraduate) on whether we should be worried about new trends in reading.

The writing is fantastic ("Hollywood remakes remakes"), and there are a number of intriguing insights such as:

The Romans ended up letting slaves, women, and such rabble read and write, but they got their comeuppance from the religion-based society that succeeded them.

Happy reading!