Peeceful Eezy Reedig

Glancing through the shelves of used book shops gives a good indication of the cultural differences - and similarities - of our generation and those that preceded and followed.

I chortled gleefully at the double entendres in the titles of the Honey Bunch books on these 1930-era covers upon which our young heroine is seen having fun in an airplane and on the great lakes (and many others not shown here). Well, I'd have to be zonked before riding in one of those spit-and-string planes and sitting on the deck of a cruise ship, so I'm with Mz Honey B all the way.

And any Mom who is concerned about the internet's negative impact on the reading skills of her brood needs look back no further than the 1960s to understand how her Ma felt when the market was flooded with 'laedybird eezy reedig books,' extolling the joys of 'peepl at wurk' such as 'the Nurs'

However, you might ask why we worry at all about literacy when we see our kids grow up to devour literary crap by the bucket load: Thirty Billion Shades Of Gray anyone?

(Yes, I am being unfair. No, I haven't read past the first page, although I did wade through one Dan Brown book, so I know of what I speak. Sort of . . .)