One in three Catalans never read books
Yesterday, culture minister Santi Vila presented the report on reading habits and buying books in Catalonia for 2016. Vila said that “our society is becoming more comparable with European customs” considering that 67.8% of Catalans are book readers and the European average is 68%. However, this means that 32.2% of Catalans never read books, a figure he considers to be too high, even though in six years this figure has fallen by 5.5%.
In response, Vila’s department has earmarked €300,000 for a new line of funding for the translation into Catalan of literary and non-literary works. This refects “the sweet moment” in the relationship between the department and the book industry, according to Vila.
Ester Franquesa, the director general of linguistic policy detailed the funds. “We intend to balance the cost of translations in Catalan to become more competitive in price in relation to Spanish,” considering that the cost is the same but not the number of potential readers.
The report, which is based on a telephone survey of 1,200 people from the age of 10, shows that 61.9% of Catalans read for leisure and 26, 5% for work or study purposes.
The report also shows that more avid readers tend to become more involved in other cultural pursuits as well.