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In schools where the librarians/English departments are backed, the reading culture improves. Where there’s a strong reading culture, the gender segregation is magically gone.
Stories are the key to unlocking creativity, empathy and playfulness
Author Nathanael Lessore writes exclusively for Pen&inc. about social media, toxic masculinity and how books can help to unlock playfulness, empathy and creativity in teenage boys.
I WASN’T creative as a teenager. Younger than that, maybe, but there were a few years when I lost my sense of play. I see it now, on my school visits, the wide eyed, playful, year- 7s who clap and cheer and participate fully in author visits, become more self-conscious in year 8. A lot of them still read, but they’re less open about it in front of their peers. By the time they’re in year 9 (14-15yo), my usual target audience, most of them have stopped reading completely outside of school hours. I was the same. Although I didn’t have screens and Youtube idols telling me what to think. I had films and TV shows, storylines, and a lot of them (other than Family Guy) had some form of moral message about kindness or togetherness. A lot of today’s teenagers don’t even have that. I was in Peckham Cinema recently, and a large group of teenagers left the film early because the film had “too much dialogue” (it was that pretty terrible, but very musical MJ film). These kids weren’t used to long form videos.
Part of it is nature, the self-consciousness, and the hormones, and the excruciating attempts at getting romantical attention. But a lot of it isn’t. Boys are taught, via YouTube and podcasts, that girls respond to dominance and put-downs, and false notions of acting “alpha” whatever the hell that means.
Spring-Summer 2026
In response, girls are afraid of boys, there’s rarely any gender mixing given the choice, and outside of the school library it’s mostly rare to witness platonic friendships between boys and girls. In response to that response, boys act up even more, and angrily blame girls for their own lack of charm and likeability.
Lost in all these dynamics, is that teenagers have lost their sense of play. Their inhibitions in this stage of life seems to keep them hostage. We’re told that they’re rude (and yet where I live in a deprived area of South London, teens are frequently, loudly thanking the bus driver as they get off the bus). We’re told that they’re all addicted to their screen (and yet most of them don’t miss their phones while they’re at school). We’re told that they simply won’t read books.
And yet, I get mobbed after every school visit. Especially by reluctant readers. They want me to sign their pencil cases, water bottles, journals, drawings, and in that queue to get stuff signed, they’ve completely forgotten that they’re supposed to be cool. They’re not surly. They’re as playful and engaged as the year 7s. And this is hopeful.
It shows that something can be done. It shows that, in a lot of places, something is being done. Case in point: I visited two different schools in
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