Americans Read Less, Buy More Homer: Cultural Consumption Trends

A recent ArtsJournal roundup highlights shifting cultural consumption patterns. Public radio's combined audience across five noncommercial formats has grown 9.6% in two years, despite funding disputes. Americans read less than forty years ago, but The Bulwark argues this is diversification rather than decline. Christopher Nolan's film adaptation of The Odyssey boosted sales of Emily Wilson's translation, which briefly became the second-bestselling book in the country. The Guardian reports on the neuroscience of concerts, emphasizing that collective effervescence requires physical presence. Psyche discusses handwriting letters as a spiritual practice of slowness. Publishers are now pressured to guarantee that a human wrote books, as reported by Christian Science Monitor. In Philadelphia, the shuttered University of the Arts building will be converted into affordable artist housing, as Hyperallergic reports. Ljubljana has opened a Bullshit Museum, as covered by The Guardian.