Reading books seems to be more effective than listening to music, or walking, when it comes to reducing stress.
Reading worked best, reducing stress levels by 68 per cent, said cognitive neuropsychologist Dr David Lewis. Subjects only needed to read, silently, for six minutes to slow down the heart rate and ease tension in the [...]
Not just reading books, but also reducing stress
Posted by John Lampard on Tuesday, 9 February, 2010 to the comment subset
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Studying history would be fun if it were more like reading a story
Posted by John Lampard on Thursday, 26 November, 2009 to the comment subset
While many latter-day historians may be a fine job of researching history, they have lost the knack of story telling, or writing in a way that history students find engaging or readable.
Most people, it seems, are not interested in reading history, at least not the history written by academic historians. Although some blame this [...]
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Lord of the Flies re-illustrated by Sam Weber
Posted by John Lampard on Monday, 2 November, 2009 to the design and art subset
A new edition of William Golding’s classic novel “Lord of the Flies” featuring the illustration work of Sam Weber, is to be published next month.
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Why the dickens are we still reading Charles Dickens books?
Posted by John Lampard on Monday, 5 October, 2009 to the comment subset
Why are the books of Charles Dickens still part of many of today’s school curriculums, almost 140 years after he died?
These are all wonderful reasons to read Dickens. But these are not exactly the reasons why I read Dickens. My search for an answer continued but never with success, until one year the little [...]
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A well rounded and varied reading list for August 2009
Posted by John Lampard on Wednesday, 5 August, 2009 to the comment subset
Titles covering politics, shooting stars, and Einstein’s E=MC2 equation, are among suggestions on Seed Magazine’s August “Books to Read Now” list.
And as an aside, yes, it’s August already.
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The Booker Prize long list for 2009
Posted by John Lampard on Thursday, 30 July, 2009 to the events subset
13 titles make it onto this year’s Booker Prize long list. The narrowed down “short list” featuring just six titles will be announced in a month or so.
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A very postmodernist list of essential reading
Posted by John Lampard on Thursday, 23 July, 2009 to the comment subset
61 essential postmodern reads: but now to answer the question, how exactly do you decide what is a postmodern book?
The thing about postmodernism is it’s impossible to pin down exactly what might make a book postmodern. In looking at the attributes of the essential postmodern reads, we found some were downright contradictory. Postmodern books have [...]
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The not so quiet evolution of reading
Posted by John Lampard on Friday, 26 June, 2009 to the comment subset
Reading hasn’t always been the silent, solitary, activity that many of us are probably used to.
The development of the way people have read mirrors the pattern of a child’s learning. In the ancient world, they read out loud and in company. In the Middle Ages, monks in their scriptoria would murmur quietly to themselves as [...]
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Opium Magazine: a story that is 1000 years in the telling?
Posted by John Lampard on Wednesday, 24 June, 2009 to the design and art subset
The cover of the latest print edition of Opium Magazine has been printed with special inks, that if left exposed to sunlight, will over the next one thousand years reveal a nine word short story.
The printing process in question is a simple but, as usual with Keats, pretty clever idea. The cover is printed [...]
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Watching movies alone to appreciate their novelistic intimacy
Posted by John Lampard on Tuesday, 9 June, 2009 to the movies subset
Movies to See Alone. In much the same way that novels can only be enjoyed alone (reading is after all a solitary experience), there are also occasions when movies are best viewed alone.
People who really love movies, and from time to time I am one of them, are always trying to get that [...]
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