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7/3/2025, 8:32:10 PM
>Max Lawton, a translator who frequently works on long European novels, scoffed at the “corny idea of the male reader” who is interested only in stereotypically masculine subjects and austere prose.
>“Being a reader is not a two-party system — you can read whatever you want,” he said.
>Even Mr. Castro, the novelist, rejected the idea of a countermovement in the name of masculine identity. “Resentment, performing or embodying a self-consciously ‘masculine’ identity at the expense of literary value, is cringe,” he wrote in an email. “‘Identity’ is not a literary value.”
>One real challenge at hand is a frenzied attention economy competing for everyone’s time, not just men’s. To present the sorry state of the male reader as having solely to do with the gendered quality of contemporary fiction misses a screen-based culture that presents nearly unlimited forms of entertainment.
>“Our competition isn’t other publishers,” said Sean Manning, the publisher of Simon & Schuster. “It’s social media, gaming, streaming. All these other things that are vying for people’s time, attention and financial resources.”
>Asked whether the publishing industry needed straight men to read more fiction as a purely economic matter, Mr. Manning focused instead on the social benefits of reading.
>“It’s a problem if anyone isn’t taking advantage of an incredible artistic medium,” he said. “It’s hurtful not to be well-rounded.”
>In an effort to get more people — yes, among them, men — to pick up his books, Mr. Manning is trying to make his own back catalog speak more to the culture at large. He has commissioned Taylor Sheridan, the creator of such man-approved shows and movies as “Yellowstone” and “Sicario,” to write the introduction to a new edition of Larry McMurtry’s classic western, “Lonesome Dove.” (Another guy-friendly introduction to an old title: the Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich on Hunter S. Thompson’s “Screwjack.”)
>Mr. Manning might be happy to reach a book club like the one Andy Spackman, 46, started in the Lawrence, Kan., area three years ago. A former construction worker married to the best-selling memoirist Sarah Smarsh, Mr. Spackman said he felt that he did not have anyone to talk to about books, and that a book club might be a good way to bond with other men.
>“I’m always seeing women out doing things and being friendlier toward each other than men are,” he said.
>“Being a reader is not a two-party system — you can read whatever you want,” he said.
>Even Mr. Castro, the novelist, rejected the idea of a countermovement in the name of masculine identity. “Resentment, performing or embodying a self-consciously ‘masculine’ identity at the expense of literary value, is cringe,” he wrote in an email. “‘Identity’ is not a literary value.”
>One real challenge at hand is a frenzied attention economy competing for everyone’s time, not just men’s. To present the sorry state of the male reader as having solely to do with the gendered quality of contemporary fiction misses a screen-based culture that presents nearly unlimited forms of entertainment.
>“Our competition isn’t other publishers,” said Sean Manning, the publisher of Simon & Schuster. “It’s social media, gaming, streaming. All these other things that are vying for people’s time, attention and financial resources.”
>Asked whether the publishing industry needed straight men to read more fiction as a purely economic matter, Mr. Manning focused instead on the social benefits of reading.
>“It’s a problem if anyone isn’t taking advantage of an incredible artistic medium,” he said. “It’s hurtful not to be well-rounded.”
>In an effort to get more people — yes, among them, men — to pick up his books, Mr. Manning is trying to make his own back catalog speak more to the culture at large. He has commissioned Taylor Sheridan, the creator of such man-approved shows and movies as “Yellowstone” and “Sicario,” to write the introduction to a new edition of Larry McMurtry’s classic western, “Lonesome Dove.” (Another guy-friendly introduction to an old title: the Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich on Hunter S. Thompson’s “Screwjack.”)
>Mr. Manning might be happy to reach a book club like the one Andy Spackman, 46, started in the Lawrence, Kan., area three years ago. A former construction worker married to the best-selling memoirist Sarah Smarsh, Mr. Spackman said he felt that he did not have anyone to talk to about books, and that a book club might be a good way to bond with other men.
>“I’m always seeing women out doing things and being friendlier toward each other than men are,” he said.
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