What happened to Our Weekend With a Book?
What happened to Our Weekend With a Book?
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Introduction
Introduction
Before, we used to go to the library every week. Especially on the weekend, we pick a book off the shelf, we start reading; we'd finish it before the next weekend. Nobody decides to stop reading. Instead, a book just quietly loses to whatever's nearby — a notification, a chore, sleep — and it keeps losing, night after night, until months later you notice the bookmark hasn't moved, and you can't even remember what page you were meant to be on. I don't think this happens because we've stopped loving stories. I think it happens because everything about how we read now — where we get books, how we hold our attention, what we expect from the first ten pages — has quietly changed. This article will discuss the library we left behind, and the book is everywhere now — so why aren't we reading?
The Library We Left Behind
The Library We Left Behind
Before, the library was more than a building full of books. We used to walk around the shelves to touch the books. We used to have a deadline for reading a book. Also, we used to have homework at school where we had to go to the library to find a dictionary, to look up the meaning of a new word, and put in a correct sentence. However, now we just type the word into a phone and get the answer in a second. Now books come to us at once, with no walk, no browsing, and no deadline to push us to finish. The library made us read, we saw other people reading, so we went into a quiet place and started reading.
The Book Is Everywhere Now — So Why Aren't We Reading?
The Book Is Everywhere Now — So Why Aren't We Reading?
We scroll social media for hours, we open articles in new tabs and never close them. Messages never stop coming, every photo has a caption, and emails come back faster than we can clear them. Now there are tools that use AI to help us read faster, like apps that sum up a book in minutes or read the words out loud for us. An e-reader holds more books than most childhood libraries did. A reading app can hand you a novel as soon as you decide you want one. You can borrow digital books from your couch with no card, no walk, and no waiting for someone to return a copy. Online stores put almost any book one click away. Audiobooks turn a commute into reading time. Book-tracking apps make reading a game.
Conclusion
To conclude, we have started to see something change: more people are choosing to buy physical books again, instead of only reading on a screen, because they miss the feel of reading a real book in their hands. Stores like Bookends are based in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, sell used physical books, are a sign of this. As we miss those old days, people are going back to the library to read in person, and they are buying physical books again, because those days we miss are still there for us. We built memories back then, and now those memories are coming back. Reading is not just a hobby; it is a must, both for learning and for everyday life. From my own point of view, this makes me think of something I learned: Allah (SWT) says, "Iqra bi-ismi rabbika allathee khalaq" (Qur'an, Surah Al-'Alaq 96:1).
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