SINGAPORE: Book clubs are here, there, everywhere these days. I would know – I started one myself.
Despite the book club hype, reading itself seems to be on the decline in Singapore amid a wave of bookstore closures and continuous drops in book borrowing. The National Library Board logged 36.3 million physical and digital loans in 2023 – 2.3 million fewer than in 2022, and well below the pre-pandemic high of 40.5 million recorded in 2019.
A 2021 study also showed that fewer and fewer of Singapore’s students enjoy reading, with only 51 per cent doing so, down from 55 per cent in 2016 and 60 per cent in 2011.
Will more book clubs actually create more readers?
As a book club enthusiast, I’m hoping the answer is yes. But as an English Literature educator, answering the question is not as straightforward as that.
First, we must understand what book clubs really do for us.
Are you someone who “wants to read but never has the time”? Join the club.
There’s no getting around it – reading is work, and it is a lot easier to zone out to Netflix or doomscroll on social media instead.
For many years, I wondered if joining a book club would get me out of my reading rut. But I’d always decided that there was nothing desirable about more deadlines or social pressure.
My impression of book clubs changed when I attended a No Readgrets Book Club session last year. Having rushed to finish the assigned book, I felt pressured going into the session. But to my surprise, some attendees hadn’t finished it at all – and there was no judgment. Everyone still contributed to the conversation meaningfully and empathetically.
I know this sounds counterproductive. Why would I celebrate the fact that book clubs don’t compel participants to finish the book?
It’s because reading for leisure should be exactly that – reading for leisure.
When I ran my first book club session in November, both attendees confessed that they hadn’t finished the entire text – Sugarbread, by Singaporean author Balli Kaur Jaswal. Even so, they openly shared their personal perspectives on key topics in the book, such as family and relationships.
One attendee shared how the very choice of a Singaporean book had made her reflect on her own Western-centric consumption of arts and media, and expressed a desire to consume more local media in varying forms.
In a book club, the key objective shouldn’t be to finish a certain number of pages, but to participate in discussions about what’s on those pages. Reading no longer becomes about meeting yet another deadline, but rather about our own intentional efforts to engage with the text.
Removing the guilt or shame of “failure” or “disappointment” from reading in this way helps to make reading much less intimidating – or at least less of a chore, especially for new readers.
I’ve heard many of my own students say this in a variety of ways: “My English isn’t good enough to talk about books.”
In a society built on meritocracy, there’s something of a Singaporean mentality that we must be not just good enough, but better than everyone at most things. How many of us feel comfortable enough to raise our hands in a class or a meeting and say, plainly and clearly, “I don’t understand”?
But reading isn’t about getting it “right”. In fact, if a book seems confusing, it might not even be a reader problem. Many writers intentionally write in ambiguous ways for creative literary purposes.
Even us English educators aren’t immune. In a writing class I took earlier this year, the instructor assigned us a passage by renowned Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez. I read it and understood absolutely nothing. Impostor syndrome reared its head, and I questioned my capabilities and competences as an educator – until, to my relief, my classmates shared that they’d struggled with the passage too.
Book clubs aren’t only for people who already live and breathe Tolstoy and Orwell. Discussions facilitated in book clubs are well-suited to helping those less confident in their language and literary comprehension skills to wade through their confusion and evaluate why a book isn’t working out.
And it’s entirely possible for any reader, rookie or veteran, to struggle with a book and yet, by talking about it with others, learn something valuable about our role as readers. For instance, we could walk away from one disappointing book armed with fresh motivation to find writers and stories that speak to us more effectively and impactfully.
In another session of my book club, we discussed The Great Reclamation, written by another Singaporean novelist, Rachel Heng. We had three groups of readers – those who’d finished the book, those who hadn’t, and an additional group of last-minute attendees who hadn’t even started the text.
The no-guilt policy made non-starters and non-finishers of the text feel comfortable enough to engage fully, regardless of their progress in the actual book. When we got to discussing the ending, some even gasped out loud, shocked at the evolution of the main character.
One attendee observed: “This is such an interesting way to read a book.” Another exclaimed: “I can’t wait to go home and finish reading this!”
In our modern world of endless distractions, what will drive us to pick up a book – and not put it down? It’s not a vague inclination to “read more”, or an arbitrary goal to finish a certain number of books within a given amount of time.
The strongest motivation will always be our own desire to engage with a story or its characters. Joining a book club has the potential to unlock that, even for more reluctant readers.
Recently, I brought a passage about a man trapped on an ice floe to my upper primary English class.
One student in this class had always complained that reading is too time-consuming. But when we finished the text, he immediately asked: “What happens in the end?”
Even more hilarious was his answer when I asked the class what they thought were the strengths and weaknesses of the story: “The weakness is you didn’t print the whole story, so now I don’t know the ending.”
And this is why I think book clubs will eventually lead to more readers – because people will always be drawn to stories. Fads and trends come and go under the spotlight, but the human instinct for curiosity and connection through narratives and characters will always remain centre stage.
Storytelling is here to stay – even if it may look a little different over time.
Even if all someone does is read the book’s Wikipedia page before showing up to a club meeting, that’s still more reading than they might have done if they hadn’t signed up at all.
Gayathrii Nathan is an educator, writer and researcher. She runs Jotter Book, where she teaches English and humanities classes, as well as a book club, One Book At A Time.
Continue reading...
Despite the book club hype, reading itself seems to be on the decline in Singapore amid a wave of bookstore closures and continuous drops in book borrowing. The National Library Board logged 36.3 million physical and digital loans in 2023 – 2.3 million fewer than in 2022, and well below the pre-pandemic high of 40.5 million recorded in 2019.
A 2021 study also showed that fewer and fewer of Singapore’s students enjoy reading, with only 51 per cent doing so, down from 55 per cent in 2016 and 60 per cent in 2011.
Will more book clubs actually create more readers?
As a book club enthusiast, I’m hoping the answer is yes. But as an English Literature educator, answering the question is not as straightforward as that.
First, we must understand what book clubs really do for us.
YOU DON’T HAVE TO FINISH THE BOOK – YAY!
Are you someone who “wants to read but never has the time”? Join the club.
There’s no getting around it – reading is work, and it is a lot easier to zone out to Netflix or doomscroll on social media instead.
For many years, I wondered if joining a book club would get me out of my reading rut. But I’d always decided that there was nothing desirable about more deadlines or social pressure.
My impression of book clubs changed when I attended a No Readgrets Book Club session last year. Having rushed to finish the assigned book, I felt pressured going into the session. But to my surprise, some attendees hadn’t finished it at all – and there was no judgment. Everyone still contributed to the conversation meaningfully and empathetically.
I know this sounds counterproductive. Why would I celebrate the fact that book clubs don’t compel participants to finish the book?
It’s because reading for leisure should be exactly that – reading for leisure.
Related:
When I ran my first book club session in November, both attendees confessed that they hadn’t finished the entire text – Sugarbread, by Singaporean author Balli Kaur Jaswal. Even so, they openly shared their personal perspectives on key topics in the book, such as family and relationships.
One attendee shared how the very choice of a Singaporean book had made her reflect on her own Western-centric consumption of arts and media, and expressed a desire to consume more local media in varying forms.
In a book club, the key objective shouldn’t be to finish a certain number of pages, but to participate in discussions about what’s on those pages. Reading no longer becomes about meeting yet another deadline, but rather about our own intentional efforts to engage with the text.
Removing the guilt or shame of “failure” or “disappointment” from reading in this way helps to make reading much less intimidating – or at least less of a chore, especially for new readers.
“MY ENGLISH NOT GOOD ENOUGH”
I’ve heard many of my own students say this in a variety of ways: “My English isn’t good enough to talk about books.”
In a society built on meritocracy, there’s something of a Singaporean mentality that we must be not just good enough, but better than everyone at most things. How many of us feel comfortable enough to raise our hands in a class or a meeting and say, plainly and clearly, “I don’t understand”?
But reading isn’t about getting it “right”. In fact, if a book seems confusing, it might not even be a reader problem. Many writers intentionally write in ambiguous ways for creative literary purposes.
Even us English educators aren’t immune. In a writing class I took earlier this year, the instructor assigned us a passage by renowned Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez. I read it and understood absolutely nothing. Impostor syndrome reared its head, and I questioned my capabilities and competences as an educator – until, to my relief, my classmates shared that they’d struggled with the passage too.
Book clubs aren’t only for people who already live and breathe Tolstoy and Orwell. Discussions facilitated in book clubs are well-suited to helping those less confident in their language and literary comprehension skills to wade through their confusion and evaluate why a book isn’t working out.
And it’s entirely possible for any reader, rookie or veteran, to struggle with a book and yet, by talking about it with others, learn something valuable about our role as readers. For instance, we could walk away from one disappointing book armed with fresh motivation to find writers and stories that speak to us more effectively and impactfully.
Related:
DEVELOPING AN INTEREST IN STORIES
In another session of my book club, we discussed The Great Reclamation, written by another Singaporean novelist, Rachel Heng. We had three groups of readers – those who’d finished the book, those who hadn’t, and an additional group of last-minute attendees who hadn’t even started the text.
The no-guilt policy made non-starters and non-finishers of the text feel comfortable enough to engage fully, regardless of their progress in the actual book. When we got to discussing the ending, some even gasped out loud, shocked at the evolution of the main character.
One attendee observed: “This is such an interesting way to read a book.” Another exclaimed: “I can’t wait to go home and finish reading this!”
In our modern world of endless distractions, what will drive us to pick up a book – and not put it down? It’s not a vague inclination to “read more”, or an arbitrary goal to finish a certain number of books within a given amount of time.
The strongest motivation will always be our own desire to engage with a story or its characters. Joining a book club has the potential to unlock that, even for more reluctant readers.
WHAT HAPPENS IN THE END?
Recently, I brought a passage about a man trapped on an ice floe to my upper primary English class.
One student in this class had always complained that reading is too time-consuming. But when we finished the text, he immediately asked: “What happens in the end?”
Even more hilarious was his answer when I asked the class what they thought were the strengths and weaknesses of the story: “The weakness is you didn’t print the whole story, so now I don’t know the ending.”
And this is why I think book clubs will eventually lead to more readers – because people will always be drawn to stories. Fads and trends come and go under the spotlight, but the human instinct for curiosity and connection through narratives and characters will always remain centre stage.
Storytelling is here to stay – even if it may look a little different over time.
Even if all someone does is read the book’s Wikipedia page before showing up to a club meeting, that’s still more reading than they might have done if they hadn’t signed up at all.
Gayathrii Nathan is an educator, writer and researcher. She runs Jotter Book, where she teaches English and humanities classes, as well as a book club, One Book At A Time.
Continue reading...