“We read to know we are not alone.”
This is a quote often attributed to C.S. Lewis, though it was more likely penned by the screenwriter for Shadowlands, a film where Anthony Hopkins portrays the legendary Chronicles of Narnia author. (If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend a viewing). Whatever the provenance, it’s one of those lines that’s remained lodged in my brain, ever since the first time I heard it.
And it turns out, there’s truth to it, the idea of reading helping you feel less alone. A growing body of research has shown that reading actually enhances our human connections and stimulates feelings of empathy in the reader. In fact, studies have shown that fiction, in particular, improves empathy by its capacity to transport the reader into another character’s mind, allowing us to experience what this or that character experiences, exposing us to life circumstances that are very different from our own.
William Chopik, a psychologist at the University of Michigan, puts it like so: “Fiction and stories… provide us with the opportunity to take other peoples’ perspectives in a safe and distanced way. In that way, fiction serves as a playground for exercising empathic skills.”
It's the final week of May. On this week's episode of Something I Heard, Tomás Baiza shares one of his own poems, titled: "Red Dye No. 40."
Our writer-curator this month, Tomás Baiza is the author of the novel, Delivery, and the mixed-genre collection, A Purpose to Our Savagery. Baiza’s manuscript, Mexican Teeth, will appear on Inlandia Press in 2026.
