This exchange between science and literature from Jerry Coyne’s Evolution is True site. (First Coyne quotes from James Wood’s How Fiction Works, then he responds):

We read fiction because it pleases us, moves us, is beautiful, and so on — because it is alive and we are alive. It is amusing to watch evolutionary biology tie itself up in circularities when trying to answer the question, ‘why do humans spend so much time reading fiction when this yields no obvious evolutionary benefits?’ The answer tend either to be utilitarian — we read in order to find out about our fellow citizens, and this has a Darwinian utility — or circular: we read because fiction pushes certain ‘pleasure buttons.’

Well, the first part is fine, but really, Professor Wood, we evolutionary biologists hardly tie ourselves up in knots about this question. Although I’m a professional in the field, I have never encountered a discussion of the adaptive significance of reading fiction, even from those evolutionary psychologists who love to masticate ideas like this. No respectable evolutionist would bother with the question, “What was the adaptive value of ‘novel-reading’ genes?” In contrast, Wood implies that this kind of story-telling is a major preoccupation of our field. Perhaps he’ll supply us with an extensive list of evolutionary studies of fiction-reading.

Reading is a recent innovation: it appeared about 5000 years ago, 0.07% of the time since we branched off from the lineage that lead to our closest living relatives. Fiction is even younger: many regard the first novel as The Tale of Genji, written about a millenium ago.

That’s not enough time for a “fiction-reading module” to evolve. (And would those who read novels really have more offspring than those who ignore the printed page in favor of seeking mates?) Further, diligent novel-reading is hardly a fixed trait in the human species. Even when novels are available, few people “spend so much time” reading them. The average American, for example, reads four books per year (not all fiction!), and one person in four reads none….

Why do I spend so much time on a footnote? Because Wood’s readers are not likely to know a lot about evolutionary biology, and so might very well conclude that we’re all a pack of morons who waste our time trying to explain the unexplainable. With this gratuitious swipe, Wood gives a bad — and false — impression of our field.

****

Odd this exchange. On the one hand Wood seems to dismiss what I think is an interesting and valid contention – storytelling serves a useful evolutionary purpose; on the other Coyne first disingenuously suggests that  "Reading" "Fiction" is a recent phenomena in the history of  homo sapienianism: surely it’s nothing if not a continuation of the practice of storytelling by other means – a practice as old as language itself , if not older; second, there are stacks of entirely respectable books that have been written on the evolutionary significance of story telling, Here’s just a small sampling:

Joseph Carroll’s Evolution and Literary Theory (1995) and Literary Darwinism: Evolution, Human Nature, and Literature (2004).

Darwin’s Cathedral by David Sloan Wilson (2003)

Jonathan Gottschall The Literary Animal, co-edited with evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson (2005); and Literature, Science and the New Humanities (2008)

The Art Instinct, Dennis Dutton (2009)

On the Origin of Stories, Brian Boyd (2009)

The rule of beautiful and traditional printing is that the two opposite pages form one unit, that the upper margin should be a little larger than the inside margin, that the fore-edge margin should be the next in size, and the lowest the greatest of all Example — old uncut books.

 The paper should be good and charming as paper; the Dutch paper is too unequal in thickness for accurate printing, and the good French papers a trifle hard- The English papers of Batchelor & Arnold cannot be matched out of this country

 Build without affectation, with  little but regular spacing between the words; a contraction is better than an overcrowding of the line; break a word in preference to spacing out the letters thus, "t h u s”  Example — nearly all modern printers.

Ink up the type gradually; to an over-inked appearance that gormes or overlays the type and decoration, usual in sham art printing, prefer under-printing even, in which, at least, nothing is added to the book by the mechanic (out of his own head). Good old books are often slightly under-pressed. Modern "Art" printers overload with ink, or like those Americans, who "beat" Morris’s perfect press work on his own ground," they use a blue-black ink of fine chemical properties.

Use decoration only when it can be urged as an added element of beauty to the book, let it accompany the text, and not gobble it up.

 In the matter of binding, if you do not employ the work of some acknowledged craftsman, see that the books are not cut but trimmed; that the end papers are not removed; in the case of a deco- rated or valuable book it is advisable sometimes to actually add a few end pages, to avoid a too great encroachment of the boards on to the inside mar- gin and its decoration. The charming flat backs inaugurated by Mr. Cobden Saunderson are less liable to do this. In the matter of tooling, etc., I think the over-pressure used by trade binders, evidence of "the craftsman’s hand’ is a mere heavy-footedness in the art resembling the idiotic burrs affectioned by the trade printers of etching.

THE END

 The Ottawa Citizen’s Peter Simpson live blogged Nick Cave’s appearance last night at an Ottawa Writers Festival pre-Festival event. Here’s how it went on the topic of The Death of Bunny Munro and its dust jacket’s walk-by sex appeal:

This is what it takes to stop a book browser down under.

 

That’s right: a bunny. (Okay…it’s the same in Britain and the U.S.)

Hold the phone: Update: My apologies to the U.S. Have just been informed that this is their cover:

NB Flowers

Incoming search terms:

• award winning book designs

Total cost including shipping: about $40 US.

Can’t wait to get my hands on it.

Elston Press.

and Carmen Callil and Colm Toibin’s The Modern Library: The 200 Best Novels in English since 1950, (who select the books they do "for their illustration of the very life of the author, the power of the live voice, the passion to tell a story, invent characters and find a form"):

Mix these titles in with the rather staid selection published by Quill and Quire magazine in its July 1999 issue, plus novels on the LRC’s 100 ‘Most Important’ Canadian Books, and you have, assuming consumption rates of about one book a week, a year’s worth of reading from which to develop your own top ten.

Incoming search terms:

• great canadian novels
• best canadian novels
• greatest canadian novels
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• best canadian photo

Volunteers setting up for the National Library and Archives’ Annual Used Book Sale at the St. Laurent Shopping Centre in Ottawa. Sale starts tomorrow morning at 9.30

"To supplement the bibliographical materials, we invited three friends to contribute essays to this book which related to publishing, collecting, typography, design and printing. The English wood engraver Simon Brett, author/editor of The Engraver’s Globe, writes about book illustration; Robert Bringhurst, poet, translator and typographer, and author of The Elements of Typographic Style, writes on the history and cultural effect of private press books; and Sjaak Hubregtse, Dutch collector and lecturer on Book History at the Professional University of Amsterdam and the Plantin Society in Antwerp, and writer on books and printing, discusses collecting private presses. Anthony Rota, leading English bookseller, author of Apart from the Text, and Godfather to Barbarian Press, has provided a delightful Foreword.

Finally, Hoi Barbaroi contains a photographic essay by David Evans, the noted Canadian photographer, which sets out in a score of photographs something of the ambience of the press.

HOI BARBAROI is issued in regular and deluxe states. The deluxe copies are bound in quarter black morocco, and accompanied by a clamshell portfolio in red silk containing a selection of original ephemera going back to the beginnings of the press, pages from earlier books, and a mint copy of our first letterpress catalogue, issued in 1998, and itself now appearing in booksellers’ catalogues. They also include a signed studio print of one of David Evans’ photographs of the press."

Deluxe Edition: Hand set in Bembo and Fairbanks italic with Bembo and Castellar for display. Facsimile text of earlier edition printed in offset facsimile from the original pages. Numerous tip-ins and illustrations, from wood engravings to pages from the original press-runs of books. David Evans’ photographic essay laid out at the press and  printed in tritone by Western Printers with captions digitally set. Printed in two colours on Zerkall mouldmade papers. Hand bound by Simone Mynen in quarter leather with printed paper over boards, gold-stamped leather label on spine. Accompanied by a clamshell box containing numerous original examples of ephemera going back to the beginnings of the press, and an additional signed studio print by David Evans. Book and box contained in a slipcase.
13 by 9 1/2 inches [330 by 241mm]
approximately 156 pages. 60 copies.
Price: C$1150

Regular Edition: Quarter bound by Rasmussen Bindery in cloth and printed paper over boards, printed label on spine. Same inclusions as Deluxe edition within book. Slipcased.
13 by 9 1/2 inches [330 by 241mm]
approximately 156 pages. 150 copies.
Price: C$650

Incoming search terms:

• HOI BARBAROI