Reading Books Can Save Your Life

I stumbled across this blog post by A.J. Jacobs, author of Drop Dead Healthy, today.  In the book, Jacobs tries "to become the healthiest person alive" (Jacobs, 2012, para. 1).  Part of his quest involved determining whether activity X was healthy.  According to Jacobs, meditating, napping, and petting dogs are all healthy activities.  Sitting, on the other hand, is "definitely not" (Jacobs, 2012, para. 2) healthy.

One activity not covered in his book is reading, so that was the focus of his blog post.

Is reading healthy?  Well, it isn't bad for your eyes, so there's that.  Jacobs also discusses Annie Murphy Paul's New York Times piece that I discussed here and points out that reading is good for your brain and makes us better human beings.  Unfortunately, there are piles of research that show that sitting is bad for you, "like a Paula Deen bacon doughnut bad" (Jacobs, 2012, para. 10).  Since most people sit while reading, that's a bad thing.  Jacobs advocates reading standing up (or even walking on a treadmill), but realizes that most people can't or won't follow that advice.  He recommends fidgeting while reading.

I have to wonder if Jacobs has spent any time with a fidgety person.  A friend and former coworker of mine is the most fidgety person I have ever met.  It's like he has daytime restless leg syndrome.  I love him to death, but his constantly moving legs are distracting and often annoying.  (Of course, he's also one of the skinniest people I know, so maybe there is something to this whole fidgeting thing.)  I can't imagine working in an office full of fidgeting people.  As for myself, it turns out that fidgeting doesn't come naturally to me.  While writing this post I've had to make a conscious effort to fidget in my chair.  I think the only hope for me is to listen to music while sitting, because I catch myself dancing in my chair all the time.  But I don't think librarianship will offer me the same sort of opportunities to spend entire workdays with earbuds in and iPod on that I had as an accountant.

The most interesting parts of the post to me, though, were the stories of reading saving lives.  Teddy Roosevelt suffered a flesh wound in 1912 after being shot in the chest at point-blank range.  How did he survive?  "The bullet was slowed by his reading glasses case and the manuscript of the speech itself" (Jacobs, 2012, para. 5).  Additionally, Ernest Shackleton took the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica on his trip to Antarctica and "ended up burning the volumes to keep from freezing" (Jacobs, 2012, para. 6).  Personally, I'd be much more interested in knowing why Shackleton took such a heavy and seemingly unnecessary thing as an entire encyclopedia to Antarctica.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Jacobs comes to the conclusion that books are good for your health.  I have to say that I agree.


Jacobs, A. J. (2012, April 12). A.J. Jacobs on why reading books can save your life [blog post]. Retrieved from http://www.omnivoracious.com/2012/04/aj-jacobs-on-why-reading-books-can-save-your-life.html