Reading with Barack Obama
Jul 19 2023
It’s that time of year again when former President Obama releases his summer reading list. “Books have always shaped how I experience the world,” wrote the former President. “Writers like Mark Twain and Toni Morrison, Walt Whitman, and James Baldwin taught me something essential about our country’s character. Reading about people whose lives were very different from mine showed me how to step into someone else’s shoes.”That’s empathy, one of the most important benefits of reading. Obama believes that reading about people whose lives are different from our own allows us to better understand and empathize with others.