Being a reader means cultivating a relationship with the world that, by most standards, can seem pointless and counterproductive.

Reading less means missing out on the brain-boosting benefits of books and more. (Photo illustration: Alex Cochran for Yahoo News; photo: Getty Images) There’s something special, even magical, about ...

Nicholas Dames has taught Literature Humanities, Columbia University’s required great-books course, since 1998. He loves the job, but it has changed. Over the past decade, students have become ...

The experiment was simple; so too, you may have thought, was the task. Students of literature at two American universities were given the first paragraphs of “Bleak House” by Charles Dickens and asked ...