The More They Read, The More They Want to Read
Bookmark with black bird - handmade by me
On a shelf that smelled faintly of dust and time stood The Children’s Book of Knowledge. Its chalk‑white pages opened like small doors into the world, inviting any curious boy or girl to step through.
First came the visitors.
Across the skies of Britain flashed colours rarely seen—
the Roller, bright as a dropped jewel,
the Bee‑Eater, slicing the air like living flame,
the Hoopoe, crowned and proud,
the shy Red‑spotted Bluethroat,
the elegant Avocet, and
the hidden Golden Oriole, singing from leafy shadows.
The book whispered that the world was wider than gardens and lanes.
Turn the page, and history rose from ink and imagination. A great wooden horse stood before the walls of Troy, silent and clever. Nearby, a black‑and‑white photograph showed the endless sands of the Sahara Desert, where the wind wrote stories no one could keep. Far to the north lay Zealand, surrounded by restless water, while deep in ancient stone corridors the Minotaur waited, half man, half mystery.
Another page, another journey.
Now the river.
It was called China’s River of Destiny—the Tsientang, carving an impressive ravine above Hangchow in southern China. The photograph could not show its sound, but the words did: thunderous water, rising tides, a force that demanded respect.
On this river lived a young Chinese girl on a narrow boat. She wore a wooden float and a safety belt at all times, even when she slept. The river was beautiful, but it was never gentle. To her, danger was ordinary, and caution was wisdom. While children elsewhere turned pages with clean hands, she learned the science of balance, weight, and survival simply by living.
The book itself bore signs of love—two pages creased at the top corner, folded long ago by a child who marked favourite wonders. The photographs were black and white, but the imagination supplied the colour. The illustrations were few, yet powerful, like secrets shared rather than shouted.
Printed in 1960, the book believed in progress, in modern enterprise, and in mankind’s endless curiosity. It taught that nature, history, science, and courage were not separate subjects—but one long story.
And, every time the book was opened, that story began again.
What struck me most was this: the knowledge inside felt unusual now.
It was broad, fearless, unafraid to mix science with myth, nature with human courage.
It taught curiosity without nostalgia and progress without noise.
Much of it—this way of seeing the world—seems absent from modern education.
What I found in that charity shop was more than an old book—it was a time capsule, chalk‑white pages, preserving a way of learning I had once lived.
In the 1990s, I was the kind of girl who lingered in libraries for hours, pulling books from shelves faster than I could carry them, wanting to read as much as possible—if not all of them. I believed knowledge would feed my imagination, that every subject opened a door to somewhere new.
I remember the library not by its address, but by its hush.
As a girl who loved reading, I knew it the moment I stepped inside—the quiet
that felt like a held breath. The soft thud of books being returned, the
whisper of turning pages, the smell of paper and dust mixed with the faint cold
of winter coats near the door. It felt safe. It felt slow.
I went there first as a child, then as a teenager, usually after school, my backpack heavy with homework and unanswered questions. I always sat near the same wooden table by the window, where the light fell gently across the pages. I moved slowly between the library aisles, reading titles under my breath, searching for a good one—the one that felt right, the one that might help.
Sometimes I was looking for answers for my homework: the meaning of a difficult word, the explanation of a poem that had confused me all day in class. Other times, I was just trying to understand myself—why certain sentences stayed with me, why some stories felt like mirrors I hadn’t known I needed. I loved the searching. Pulling a book from the shelf, skimming the first page, deciding to keep it or return it. Trusting my gut before my logic caught up.
If I didn’t understand something, I stayed with it. I didn’t swipe it away. I reread. I compared. I thought. Sometimes the answer came, sometimes it didn’t—but something always changed in the waiting.
This book from charity shop comes from that same spirit: a time when education trusted curiosity, when science sat comfortably beside myth, and imagination was not a distraction from learning but its beginning.
Every time I open it, that earlier way of seeing the world returns.
And now, in 2026, it makes me wonder—when learning often feels rushed and noisy, what might return if we gave children back those quiet hours I once had, the freedom to wander library aisles, to follow curiosity without urgency, and to grow into knowledge slowly, the way wonder always grows best?
This old book is the opposite of contemporary publications, especially when it comes to the increasingly common use of digital illustrations and the absence of words, sentences, apostrophes, commas that ensure clarity, dashes, and adverbs. It lacks colourful illustrations; there are only black-and-white ones on every other or third page, but they are very classic.
Books of this kind will always inspire me because they contain a wealth of knowledge distinct from contemporary knowledge—they are not repurposed, remixed, or placed in new contexts across various platforms, or even in other published works.
Then one day, seeing that reading books was slowly being replaced by doomscrolling by one of my children, I came up with an idea to try to interest them in reading again. That's because I understand that even reading just one page a day can help them grow intellectually, and improve their writing, word choice, and understanding of the text they're reading.
So, I cut out a tiny piece from an old green sheet of paper, glued a black bird I’d drawn onto it, and added a few playful elements—all using just two simple coloured crayons and a pen.
I handed it to my child.
Her smile was the sweetest thank-you I could ever imagine.
The bookmark didn’t work miracles overnight, but little by little, day by day, with my encouragement to read instead of scrolling through web pages, it helped make reading a daily routine, even if it was just half a page.
This bookmark is on the top of my blog post today. You can try make your own and share with your child or grandchild.
What happens when answers come before curiosity has time to
stretch?
When problems are solved with speed rather than patience?
When intuition—the slow, inner knowing that grows through searching—is no
longer invited into the process?
I don’t blame online portals. I just wonder what might be missing. What might return if we gave children back those quiet hours I once had—the space to wander library aisles, to follow curiosity without urgency, to struggle gently with understanding before arriving at an answer.
Where does it all lead us, if we no longer leave room for wondering?
Because wonder never grew quickly for me.
It grew slowly, in silence, between shelves—inside a teenage girl who learned
not just how to find answers, but how to listen for them.
If you enjoy this post, you may also like my reflection about a quiet place to read.
Until the next post
