Arts & Issues - The Big Read - America's Biggest Book Club

A great book enlightens and enchants. It awakens our imagination, enlarges our humanity and can often console and comfort us. The Big Read, an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts, was created in response to a 2004 study that found that less than half of the adult American population now reads literature (which is defined as novels or short stories, poetry and drama.) It hopes to restore reading to the center of American culture. Citizens across the country will have the opportunity to read and discuss a single book within their own communities.

Kansas City's Big Read focuses on Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms. Henry Fortunato, Director of Public Affairs, Kansas City Public Library and Dr. Jane Wood, Chair of the English Department at Park University, join us to explain why the NEA chose Kansas City and why we should get involved. During Oct and Nov, Big Read will feature more than a dozen events around the community, including lectures, exhibits, film screenings, and book discussion groups.