Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Why we should read fiction

I can't even remember the last time I read a fiction book, but this eloquent piece by the Philosopher Mom just about has me convinced to explore new areas of the bookstore:

We should read fiction because it speaks the language a whole dimension of ourselves that perhaps the Summa Theologica does not: the imagination, the will, the heart. It engages our intellect, too, in a new way: Rather than an analysis of a problem, it invites the reader to inhabit the questions at hand. If holiness or viciousness are only fully grasped in an encounter with a living person who is either holy or vicious, then fiction can draw us ore closely to a lived experience of these realities.

Read the rest here.

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