Learned helplessness

• A few years ago the dating website eHarmony concluded that profiles that included reading in their list of hobbies were more attractive to the opposite sex.
• Specifically, the data revealed that men who mentioned reading as one of their personal interests received 19% more messages, while for women, those who said they read received only 3% more messages.

Marilyn Monroe reading Ulysses

• It should be made clear that Winterson is referring to a specific set of photos: those of Marilyn Monroe reading Ulysses by James Joyce.
• When they stopped in a park, Monroe became engrossed in reading Ulysses while Arnold inserted a roll of film into her camera.
• It is obvious that Marilyn Monroe – or Paul Newman, for that matter – is sexy with or without reading.

St. Ambrose reading in silence

• This is what St. Augustine must have experienced when, toward the end of the 4th century, he observed St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan, reading in silence:
  “But while reading, his eyes glanced over the pages, and his heart searched out the sense, but his voice and tongue were silent.
• Ofttimes, when we had come (for no one was forbidden to enter, nor was it his custom that the arrival of those who came should be announced to him), we saw him thus reading to himself, and never otherwise.” (St. Augustine, “Confessions”, VI, 3)
  “But while reading, his eyes glanced over the pages, and his heart searched out the sense, but his voice and tongue were silent.
• Ofttimes, when we had come (for no one was forbidden to enter, nor was it his custom that the arrival of those who came should be announced to him), we saw him thus reading to himself, and never otherwise.” (St. Augustine, “Confessions”, VI, 3) It is no wonder that St. Augustine was surprised by the silent exercise of reading, since, at that time, all readings were done aloud.

Fascination for readers

• “Reading is sexy” continues to be a slogan that tries to draw attention, especially in specific circumstances, but it is not something new.
• From a psychological point of view, perhaps there is some truth in our fascination with these images.
• In other words, a reader’s face is a kind of window into the world created by the book.”

The mystery of reading

• The last photograph in this gallery is actually the one of Marilyn Monroe reading Ulysses.
• It is the perfect time for us to give ourselves the opportunity to lose ourselves in the feelings and fantasies that come from reading.