100+ Interesting Facts About Books, Writers and Reading

There is nothing better than reading the best book ever. Even if you are a book-worm and spend too much of your free time working on amazing writing, no doubt, you would still want to know about astonishing, funny, and sometimes, even weird facts about books and their authors. At BooKKooks, you are invited to learn the top interesting facts that would surprise you.

Amazing Book Records

The first books appeared a long time ago, that is why, for sure, each of the oldest books has at least one mysterious fact about it. However, new books are equal to their older versions and they do have their own interesting facts.

The first piece of literature

The first found and still currently existing novel is from Mesopotamia. This piece of literature is a poem, Epic of Gilgamesh, and the text is on 12 clay tablets. Thanks to modern technologies, nowadays the whole text has been digitized and is available for downloading.

The text was written in Old Babylonian and the approximate date of their creation is in the 18th century B.C.

The first printed book

The first released book ever, no doubt was a revolutionary event in human history, which was accomplished because of 2 main reasons: the first printed book and invention of the first printer. Both of them were done by German Johannes Gensfleisch zum Gutenberg in the 15th century. The printing was of the Bible in 1453 A.D., and consequently, it was called Gutenberg Bible.

The biggest paper book

The biggest paper book is the giant tome which is called This the Prophet Mohamed – about the prophet of monotheistic teachings and who founded Islamic ideology. This book was made by the Mshahed International Group and released in February 2012. Its size is 5 by 8.06 meters and there are 429 pages. The weight is around 3,000 pounds. Now it is located in Dubai, UAE.

The first novel

The first modern novel is considered to be the Japanese novel, The Tale of Genji which was written by a woman in the beginning of the 11th century. The novel is about one of the Japanese emperor’s son, Shining Genji, and his lady-in-waiting. Murasaki Shikibu was the author. The original text was written in Japanese, however, it wasn’t translated into English of high quality until the 20th century due to the archaic language.

The most striking thing is that the original text was written on concertina (like a small accordion) and unfortunately, it doesn’t exist anymore.

The first typewritten text

While the first printed book was in the 15th century, the first typewritten text was released later. The author is considered to be one of the well-known American writers – Mark Twain, and he sent the first typewritten copy ever to a publisher. The title of this story is “Life on the Mississippi,” which was created in 1882. However, the manuscript wasn’t typed by Twain’s own hand, but by his secretary, Isabel V. Lyon.

The biggest book ever

The biggest book ever wasn’t made from paper but from marble tablets joined together. In fact, there were 730 tablet pages, and both sides of each page were full of text. The book contains the scripture of Theravāda Buddhism, and originally it was decorated with precious stones and all the symbols were done in golden ink. The book was created by King Mindon Min in 1857.

The biggest printing

The biggest printing ever was a copy of The Little Prince created by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in Brazil. The dimensions of this book were 10.10 feet wide and 6.59 feet high. It was created specially for the Biannual Book Fair in Rio De Janeiro in September 2007. In addition, this novel was translated into 300 languages and obtained the status of the best book of the 20th century.

The thickest printing

The thickest printing ever was made by one of the most famous detective story-writers, Agatha Christie. In fact, the writing was about the successful crime-solver lady, Miss Marple. As for the print, it consists of 20 stories and 12 mystery novels, and each of them has its own case and involved characters. The short stories were printed on 4,032 pages.

The longest book ever

The longest book ever is considered to be In Search of Lost Time or also known as Remembrance of Things Past created by Marcel Proust. It consists of more than 9,600,000 characters. It became famous thanks to the translations of C. K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin; however, the world also knows the version of the Search of Lost Time that was translated by D. J. Enright in 1992.

The longest book to listen

A Japanese work also hit a record as the longest audio track. The author of this work is Takaaki Yoshimoto with his lectures.

The overall time of the track is almost 7,000 minutes, which means that the potential listener would have to listen to this track for more than 5 days without pause. The book’s title is 50 Lectures, and it contains lectures collected during 1690s-1970s.

The longest sentence

Despite the longest book consisting of more than 9 million characters, the longest sentence is not in that book. According to Barnes and Noble, the longest sentence is in Les Miserables created by Victor Hugo. The number of words is 823.

The first bestseller

The definition of “bestseller” appeared when trading and advertising were developing. The first usage and application of this word to a book was in 1889. That book was written by Alice Brown. The name of the book is Fools Of Nature.

The youngest author

There are 2 names of very young people whose books were printed. The first author is a little girl named Dorothy Straight who described how the world began in a book with the same name. It was printed in 1964 when the author was 6 years old.

The book written by a 5-year-old boy Adauto Kovalski da Silva was created in Brazil. His printed work Aprender é Fácil was released in October 2005.

The most expensive printing ever

The most expensive printing ever, simultaneously the first printed book in the New World, is the Bay Psalm. The book was printed by the press in Cambridge, MA, which was 20 years after the pilgrims landed in America in 1620. The Bay Psalm was sold at auction for more than $14 million in 2013. The book consists of a metrical structure, but none of the psalms are in use anymore due to poor English.

The smallest book

The smallest book is quite unusual to ordinary people. In fact, this book, or it might be better to all it a reproduction of a printing, was made for experimental purposes in a lab by Robert Chaplin. The letters are not typed or printed but carved in microtablet which is 0.07 mm by 0.1mm. This means that reading this book is doable only by using special electron microscope.

The most expensive book

In fact, the most expensive book is not what we might be used to. This is the original notebook of Leonardo da Vinci, which consists of his handwritten ideas and small sketches spread over 72 pages. In 1717, the notebook was first sold to Thomas Coke, Earl of Leicester. Consequently, the notebook was called The Codex Leicester. In 1994, Bill Gates bought it at auction, and the price exceeded 29 million Euros.

Books with skin cover

Not everyone knows that in the medieval age, books were made only from natural materials such as leather, wood, etc. However, some of the copies were wrapped with human skin. Four particular books are stored in the Harvard University Library.

Total amount of books

Unfortunately, there is no information on how many books are there in the world now. However, according to research in 2010, Google announced that there were more than 130 million. It’s quite obvious that the current number is much larger than it was almost 10 years ago. The approximate number of books published every year is 750,000.

This is just the beginning, and hopefully you found the above-mentioned details interesting, since they are not wide-spread.

Weird Facts About Banned Books

Every country has at least one book which has been banned for political or cultural purposes. Most of them contradict the country’s ideology. But, this doesn’t mean that those books are not read by millions; in fact, forbidden fruit is sweeter and lots of people try to find and read a specific book by bypassing all the bans. Here are some weird facts about banned books.

Holy book

Believe it or not, the book known around the world, the holy book, the Bible, is also a subject to constant arguments. The earliest ban was ordered in the 13th century by King James I of Aragon, and all the copies belonging to people were burnt. Nowadays, the Bible is forbidden in Saudi Arabia, while other countries do ban only particular versions or translations.

Ironic ban

The most weird and ironic act was banning the book which depicts a world where books are constantly banned – Fahrenheit 451. The work was written by Ray Bradbury, and the title of the book defines the temperature a book requires to catch the fire. This work had plenty of challenges, and it is still considered to be a book which shouldn’t be excluded from the list to be read by children.

Potter’s got the red card

Did you know that the most successful and the most read English book among children all over the world, Harry Potter, is banned? In fact, it has been being challenged for 20 years, since the first chapter was released in 1999. Despite the other books that are usually banned because of abusive language or scenes, this piece of children’s literature was excluded because of potential children imitating the main characters.

Red card to Lord of the Rings, too

Despite the fact that the author was a genuine Christian and numerous details have references to Christian definitions of good and evil, Tolkien’s work The Lord of the Rings was also banned. The reason was for the satanic evidences described in the book, moreover, one of the copies was burnt by a church in New Mexico in 2001. However, this work is still considered as one of the most successful works in contemporary literature.

Sacrifice for English

In the medieval ages, a scholar in England, William Tyndale, had an idea that all people have to be able to read holy texts. At that time, all particular texts were written in Latin only, and only educated people could read the manuscript in Latin. When WIlliam released a translated English version of a religious book, King Henry VIII had another point of view and ordered his death.

However, after a while, the king changed his mind and gave permission to translate religious books into English.

Eliminate through bonfire

The most massive and unjust ban ever was through fire which appeared from time to time in Europe throughout the medieval ages. However, the bonfire that destroyed numerous great works of the world was in Germany. In fact, there were 2 times when bonfires destroyed the world’s legacy and both were started by students. The first was in the beginning of the 19th century and then again in 1933. The reason was anti-German ideology.

The earliest banned book ever

Do you think that books were banned only in recent years and in the medieval ages? If so, that’s wrong, since the first books ever were subject to someone’s opinion, and not always was it the same as the author’s opinion. The best example is Homer’s The Odyssey, which was contradictory to Caligula’s tyrannical regime, since Homer’s work showed examples of successful democracy and independence.

The most banned authors

The most banned authors appear in every country, but here is a list of authors who were banned all over the world more than once and for various works.

They are as follows: Gustave Flaubert for his novel Madame Bovary (1856); D.H. Lawrence for his Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1928), The Virgin and the Gypsy (1930), Women in Love (1920); Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita (1955); and the J.K. Rowling Harry Potter series of books.

Early erotic book

Erotic books existed a long time ago. However, the literature about pornography didn’t spread among ordinary people. Baudelaire, a French poet, was one of those who was banned because of content which might have turned on ordinary people after reading his poems. There were 13 poems, but only 6 of them were defined as inappropriate.

Teachers mustn’t speak about homosexuality

In the UK, as in other countries, it’s not permitted to speak to children about homosexuality. Unfortunately, one of Shakespeare’s works, Twelfth Night, was included in the reading program, which made teachers touch a forbidden topic. Thus, parents did everything possible in order to exclude this play and prevent children from unnecessary discussions of this topic.

Supernatural is not allowed

While adolescents enjoyed watching Twilight and the proceeding chapters in movie format, the original book was criticized and challenged by churches and society in the 2010s.

There were lots of reasons, but the most vital is the number of explicit sexual acts which are unsuited for a young age group.

Moreover, there were attempts to exclude all the supernatural literature from school libraries.

Forbidden list

There was a list created by the Authority of the Roman Catholic Church, which contained the titles of forbidden books. The main reason of their ban was their danger to morality and religion. The list was created by Pope Paul IV in 16th century, and since that time 20 popes have reissued it.

Boomerang effect

The boomerang effect works constantly, and one person who experienced such an effect was obsessed with religion, named Savonarola, who lived in the 15th century. At the end of the century, he promoted the idea of destroying all famous writings and paintings though the bonfire. After a while, he suffered the same fate and all his works were burnt along with him.

Brevity is the soul of wit

“Brevity is the soul of wit” – this approach was in mind of a censor who worked at Shakespeare’s work in 1818. The censor’s name was Thomas Bowdler and he was a physician, so he decided to create an alternative version which he called “family friendly” that was based on Shakespeare’s work.

However, his approach wasn’t so successful, moreover it was literally shredded, otherwise the word “bowdlerizing,” which means to shorten in improper way, wouldn’t exist.

Everybody makes mistakes

Author of children’s literature and educator, Bill Martin Jr., was trying to publish his child’s book about bears when the censor didn’t release it. It turned out that the censors decided that the author was a Marxist because of a mix-up with a man with the same name. However, they were different authors just with identical names.

Some wine for grandma

There are lots of theories about Little Red Riding Hood, but the main action part is where the dangerous wolf appears. However, this time, it was not the text that was under the focus but the pictures for the book made by Trina Schart Hyman. One picture showed Red Riding Hood carrying a basket with treats for grandma, and among the treats there was a bottle of wine.

Oliver Twist

The well-known writer, Charles Dickens, has never been banned because of his works, but there were a few attempts to do so.

Oliver Twist was challenged since it was suspected that it brought up racist ideas which could offend Jewish people.

Luckily, neither the play nor the book were banned thanks to the decision of The Supreme Court for King’s County.

Communism can’t be criticized

George Orwell’s works were always subject to criticism, and the most “famous” and banned book was his 1984. The main reason why the book caused so much negative feedback is that the novel depicts anti-communism. Thus, in the USSR and China, it disappeared for a long time, but in 1990s it was back in the USSR after numerous editions.

Dictionary is a book

Webster’s Dictionary is wide-spread and is commonly used by lots of users, especially children in schools. However, in 2010 the dictionary was removed from the list of books that can be used by kids, due to an explanation of “oral sex.”

Beauty can be banned as well

One of the best works among classic novels was written by Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre. Despite the plot is one of the famous works ever well-known all over the world, but the behavior of the main character was considered to be defiant. In addition, some people thought that the girl lived in sin which was inadmissible, especially at that time.

Those facts were dedicated to banned books, including classics and contemporary literature. This is not the limit, since every book is challenged and everything receives feedback: neutral, negative, and positive. Stay with us, as the next facts will be more exciting — promise!

Exciting Facts About Comic Books

Comic books can be both fun and a great way to spend your time relieving anxiety and stress. Fortunately, comics do have their own history as to how they became popular and what they experienced before they become so popular all over the world. Now, you are going to find out interesting facts about comics.

Nazi fighter

Comic books were popular even before World War II. One of the most popular comics was about the superhero Red Bee. His superpower was in his specially trained bees, which were hidden in his buckle. When the superhero called them, they went out and attacked his enemy. Mostly, the enemies were Nazi soldiers. The first comics about Red Bee appeared in the 1940’s.

The first action comics

The first superhero who fought against enemies and saved the world from destruction was Superman. This character is the main character among the huge family of comic superheroes. Many of contemporary superheroes were created in the image of Superman.

That is why the first action comic is considered to be a standard and the most valuable, thus the copy of the comics released in 1938 sold for more than $1.5 million.

The biggest comic cover

Deadpool is now a popular superhero, and in large measure this is due to the film version. But did you know that Deadpool, particularly comic book #27, holds a Guinness Record? This release is considered to have a cover which contains one of the longest titles among comic books, with 232 characters.

The largest collection of comic books

The largest collection of comics is not private and it was bought for an exorbitant amount of money. In fact, this collection is available to ordinary people in the Library of Congress. The collection consists of more than 100,000 copies and includes some rare copies of comics. However, according to another source, Bob Bretall has the same amount of comics as this collection. He started to collect comics in 1970.

Green superhero is gray

Believe it or not, but originally, the Hulk green superhero was supposed to be gray. The color was changed to green due to the issues received by printers. If Hulk had been gray, the printers would have made some pictures of Hulk black. Thus, publishers decided to change the color into something more stable, and that’s how Hulk became green.

Alternative Spider Man

In the end of the 20th century, Marvel decided to create something unusual but also involving well-known heroes from the Marvel Universe. Thus, they created an alternative reality where Peter Parker was not Spider-Man but a Sheep Boy, bitten by a sheep. His main antagonist was The Wolf.

Life-changing decision

Have you ever thought about how would you have lived if the Marvel Universe had not existed? This is a true fact that the founder of Marvel, Martin Goodman, made in a vital life-changing decision in his life, when he refused to go by ship but by plane. He and his wife later found out that they could die on a ship, since it crashed.

Another life twist

Stan Lee is one of the most famous comics creators and author of many well-known superheroes. However, they would never have appeared if Martin Goodman asked him to create something new. Some time before this conversation, Stan Lee said to his wife that he was going to leave Marvel Comics. But he stayed and then created the beloved X-Men, Spider-Man, and Fantastic Four.

The largest comics company

After Martin Goodman’s death, his company is still functioning and publishes lots of comics and other magazines. In addition, Marvel became the top company among companies publishing comics. According to stats received in 2017, Marvel has more than 38% score, while its competitor DC has 34% and Image has 10%.

Comics are not humorous

The word “comics” contains the word “comic” which refers to comic insertions in magazines which were very popular in the 19-20th centuries. However, those insertions were modified to pictures with words, and that’s how the idea of comics appeared.

Popstar is a fan of comics

The popstar, Michael Jackson, was keen on comics. He wanted to play a role of Spider-Man or Professor Xavier in the movies.

In the end of the 90s he decided to meet with Stan Lee and discuss whether he could purchase Marvel Comics and star in the films.

Comics eras

No matter what comic company released the comics, all the books belong to a particular comics era. The first one is the period of time when the first comics appeared, which is called the Golden Era (1938-1955). This era was just the beginning, and most superheroes fought Nazis, which was influenced by World War II. The second era was the Silver Era from 1955 to 1970, which was the most successful period, when the comics were made more detailed. The last one is the Modern Era, from 1985 until now. The main idea is fighting enemies.

Superhero is fired

While the superhero was quite popular and encouraged people before World War II, serving as anti-Nazi propaganda, after this his popularity decreased greatly. The problem was that the authors still published pictures where superheroes fought Nazis, but people thought that this was a sign of violence. Moreover, caring parents thought that these comics may lead to children’s cruelty.

Double identity

Have you ever seen Captain Marvel? Most likely you will say “yes,” but you might be thinking about another Captain Marvel which was created by Marvel Comics. In fact, there is another Captain Marvel that was created by DC before Marvel’s, and in the 60s he was adopted by Marvel Comics after DC stopped publishing comics about him in the 50s.

There were tries to reanimate him in the 70s, but, unfortunately, at that time, they had no rights to use this name anymore, thus he was then called Shazam.

I didn’t mean that!

The presses used for printing comics could cause some problems. The reason was their quality, since some letters could be modified into other letters, thus making abusive words. This happened with I and L close together, which formed the letter U, etc.

You can’t use “superhero”

The word superhero is under copyright law since the comics companies have reserved this word. But it doesn’t mean that you can’t use it in everyday talk, texts, or posts you share on-line. You just can’t use it in comics. It’s paradoxical, but only 2 companies are legal owners of the word “superhero”: Marvel Comics and DC. The main question is how do they share their right to use it?

Micky Maus vs superheroes

The most popular comics are not about superheroes. In fact, there exist lots of characters in comics and not all of them are superheroes. For example, the Micky Maus series created in Germany is the most popular comics ever, in 1st place. In second place is The Beano British magazine, and only at 4th and 5th place come the superheroes Superman and Batman, accordingly.

Iron man

Iron man is one of the most beloved characters in comics. The idea for this character was to be the least favorite among the superheroes of the Marvel Universe but then he was supposed to make everyone love him. Stan Lee was inspired to create this hero by the Cold War between the USSR and the USA, showing all the newest technologies in one character.

ComicEx

While the popularity of comics grew, nobody ever thought about how the comics are shipped to a customer. In fact, the monopoly of comics shipment also grew, and now Diamond Comic Distributors is the only company that specializes in delivering comics. In some way, this monopoly is good for tracking how many copies are published.

What does “DC” mean?

In fact, only a few know that DC is an abbreviation which stands for Detective Comics. Thus, if you want to say DC Comics, think twice, because otherwise you could literally say Detective Comics.

Comics have always been the most awaited books among youngsters and mature people alike. Every issue brings lots of fun and joined people in discussing the plot of each new issue. However, comics are not the only thing which bring pleasure, so go on reading for new interesting facts.

Cool Things About Children’s Books

Beautifully illustrated books with poems inside are a universal present for any child. And of course, they have a long history, too. Let’s find out the most interesting things related to children’s books, as for sure, you have never even thought about some of them.

First children’s books

The first children’s books were Japanese scrolls. They did have both illustrations and text. First, they appeared between the 12th and 13th centuries. The first fantasy-based children’s book is considered to be The Hope of the Katzekopfs, created by F. E. Paget in 1884. Modern children’s books usually contain around 30 pages.

Caroll’s first performance

Unlike the widespread opinion that Lewis Carroll (whose real name was Charles Dodgson) created his first tales in his mature life, he took his first steps as a writer when he was a teenager.

He created some kind of magazines with the mission to entertain his younger brothers and sisters.

Alice’s adventures

The adventures of a young lady named Alice made the weirdest book ever. First of all, it was challenged because the author was suspected to be using drugs. However, numerous research studies found nothing illegal, and the book was released. In fact, Alice did exist in real life, as well as the tree where the Cheshire cat lived, and the author was inspired by the real girl Alice Liddell.

Another Alice

While the first chapter of Alice’s adventures was written under inspiration by a little girl that Lewis Carroll knew, the next chapter’s protagonist was inspired by another person. In fact, at the time when the tale was being written, Lewis Carroll wasn’t connected to Liddell’s family any more. However, Alice’s protagonist was the author’s cousin, Alice Raikes, standing in front of a mirror.

Narnia

The Narnia Universe would have never existed if it were up to the author’s friends. When the first manuscript was ready, C.S. Lewis gave it to his friends, but they criticized it a lot and the author decided to destroy it. Its title was The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. Fortunately, the new version was written from scratch, and consequently he released it, which brought him success.

Author without education

Despite Beatrix Potter, author of children’s books including The Tale of Peter Rabbit, having no higher education, she learned by herself. She also worked with watercolors very well and created a collection of fungi pictures, which was highly respected by mycology specialists.

Never give up

Publishers didn’t want to publish Beatrix Potter’s The Tale of Peter Rabbit, thus she received lots of rejections. But then, she decided to create copies by herself with her drawings, and as a result there were 250 copies made. As of now, the number of sold copies exceeds 45 million.

Long-suffering Pinocchio

Not everyone knows that Disney’s Pinocchio was adopted from an Italian tale about a wooden boy created by Carlo Collodi in 1883. In fact, the Disney version differs from the original version greatly, as it doesn’t include some episodes from Pinocchio’s adventures, such as: being scratched by a fox and cat while they were trying to steal his money, etc.

The spy

Arthur Ransome, well-known for his book Swallows and Amazons, was patriotic for his country and especially for his native place of living, as was wonderfully described in the above-mentioned novel. However, due to his connection to leaders of the revolution in Russia and then his marriage to Trotsky’s secretary, the Secret Intelligence Service believed that the writer was a spy.

The first in The New York Times

The Harry Potter book series became one of the most successful children’s book series ever. Thus, The New York Times placed Harry Potter on the list of the best books. This is the first children’s book which appeared in this list since 1952, after E. B. White’s Charlotte’s Web.

The last is the best

It’s quite difficult to compare books to Harry Potter; however, as you know already, this series brought a stunning result. Although the first chapters were the best selling, the quickest sold book was the last one. Over 50 million were sold on the first day of release, and currently there is information that, in total, over 450 million printings were sold.

Unexpected present

Sometimes the authors of children’s books don’t have kids or their children might have died early. Thus, the writers do not know who to bequeath her savings to. Margaret Wise Brown was lonely and she had nothing to do but bequeath her savings and possible earnings from her sold copies to the young boy who lived next door.

Promotion

Usually, the cartoon or book characters become popular after successful release, and their image becomes a brand which is printed on postcards, bags, etc. In the case of Care Bears, everything was vice versa. They first appeared on greeting cards, and then they became popular and appeared in TV shows, movies, music tracks, etc.

Noble act

The author of Peter Pan became quite a rich person when his tale about Peter Pan was released. He bequeathed the copyright to the Great Ormond Street. Despite the fact that the rights on the books expired in 2007, the hospital still receives earnings from theatre plays in the UK.

Popular girl’s name

After releasing Peter Pan, lots of girls were named Wendy, thanks to the one of the main character’s name.

Because of that, there appeared the common misconception that the name “Wendy” was fictive. In fact, that wasn’t correct, since “Wendy” existed before, too.

Caterpillar

When The Very Hungry Caterpillar was released, the author couldn’t even imagine how successful it would be. Even if he had decided to change the title to A Week With Willi Worm, one copy still would have been bought every minute around the world, as it happens nowadays.

Paddington Bear

Paddington originally was a simple teddy which was the last toy left on the showcase of a toy store on Christmas Eve. Michael Bond was passing by when he saw the lonely toy, and he felt sad so he decided to buy it. As a result, this teddy bear inspired Michael to create the tale where teddy was given the name Paddington, thanks to the store’s proximity to the Paddington railway station in London.

Thorny path

When Dr. Seuss was trying to publish his first book, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, none of the 20 publishers wanted to publish it due to it being an “unsalable fantasy.” Dr. Seuss almost destroyed the manuscript after the 20th rejection, but he was walking down a street when he met his classmate, who introduced him to James Henle who was known for his pliability. Finally, book was going to be published, with some conditions: changing the title and the main character’s name.

The name was changed to a classmate’s son’s name, and dedicated to a classmate’s wife.

Overestimated expectations

It often happens that people do overestimate their efforts and then they face a problem with completing their task. The same happened with Dr. Seuss who was famous for his book, The Cat in the Hat. When he started working on this tale, he never expected that “a week or so” would be prolonged up to a year and a half.

Google expands

Google gradually has been achieving leading positions in all spheres. When the well-known e-mailing service Gmail was ready to be brought to life, gmail.com was busy… by Garfield.com. That e-mail was dedicated to receiving and answering to fans’ letters.

Curious George

The tale about Curious George would have never been released if the author H. A. Rey and his wife, Margaret, hadn’t take a manuscript of the tale with them when the Nazis invaded Paris. They saved the manuscript by taking it with them when they escaped by bikes. By the way, if you have ever been curious about how Curious George got America – the answer is that he captured it with the yellow hat.

Pi-ka-chu

Pokemon was originally a comic book published by the Japanese Pokemon Company. Furthermore, all the Pokemon species were adopted as movies, animated movies, TV shows, then mobile games, cards, etc. In 1997, after watching an ordinary TV episode about Pokemon, almost 700 children were hospitalized with seizures, vomiting, and vertigo.

Big Red Dog

Every child is familiar with the tales about the Big Red Dog. But only a few know that author Norman Bridwell almost released the book with the dog’s name as Tiny instead. However, his wife suggested he change his name to Clifford, the name of wife’s imaginary friend in her childhood.

Failed acquaintance

One of Beatrix Potter’s fans was little Roald Dahl. When he was a child, he asked his mom to take him to Beatrix Potter’s house, because he wanted to get acquainted with her. Unfortunately, Beatrix was not very hospitable, and she drove out unpleasant guests.

Hopefully, you enjoyed these collected facts about books for young learners. Of course, this list is endless, but here are collected the most interesting and less popular ones. I promise, you will like the next facts, too!

Other Interesting Facts About Writers and Novels

Finally, you’ve reached the section that will reveal more hidden details about authors and their works. Here you will find information which doesn’t fit into previous sections, since it’s more general rather than particular and related to comics or children’s books. Keep on reading!

Great people read a lot

Well-known personality in the USA, Theodore Roosevelt had exceptional skills and his self development was at a high level. All these skills and knowledge were obtained through reading books. Indeed, he read at least one book per day.

The reading nation

How many books do you read per year? Let’s imagine that every evening there is nothing to do except sit in front of the fireplace with a mug of hot chocolate and read a book. Probably, this is the reason why Icelandic people hit the record for the most reading nation in the world.

Dangerous game

Everybody knows that nobody messes with North Korea. But Adam Johnson was the first author who decided to create a fiction novel, The Orphan Master’s Son, about lawful acts.

Luckily, the perception of this work was good enough that the author won numerous awards.

Title page

In ancient times, books were precious things, thus, lots of them would be decorated with stones and gold. It used to be that the title was written with golden ink, which excluded the author’s name.

Production of books

A regular tree can produce up to 2,000 pounds of paper. Taking into account that a regular box of paper weighs around 5 pounds, then it’s likely that 10,000 – 20,000 sheets of A4 paper can be made from one tree. Considering this information, the approximate amount of books can be made from one tree is around 50.

Little Einstein

Stephen Hawking, who is well-known for his work A Brief History of Time about space principles, showed his intelligence in his early years, too. Thus, when he was a teenager, he, along with his friends, created a computer using just details from home appliances, such as a telephone and clock. As a result, his friends gave him the nickname: “Einstein.”

The widely read books

Of course, there are some books that are pretty popular all over the world, and all of them are sold and read by numerous people. However, there are only 3 extremely widely read books: The Holy Bible, Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-Tung, and Harry Potter.

The largest amount of the book stores

It is no secret that reading books will never go out of fashion. However, some nations and countries are considered to read more than others. Thus, it was noticed that the quantity of bookstores in Mississippi, Texas, and Nevada are the largest, taking into account the quantity of people living there.

Women like reading

The largest demographic of customers who generally buy books are women. They make up 68% of customers who buy books every year.

Moreover, it is reported that the quantity of copies bought by women every year varies from 1 to 5, while men hardly ever buy more than 1 book per year.

Bookworms are real

If you are one of those people who doesn’t remember a time when you were not reading, then you have probably heard the phrase “you are a bookworm” from your friends. In fact, this nickname is based on a real fact. Bookworms do exist, and they are insects who eat book bindings.

Books as a building material

In the 2000s, The UK’s M6 Toll was under reconstruction. As it was reported later, copies of Mills & Boon romantic novels were used as an auxiliary material for reconstruction. There were 2.5 million copies that were used in total, which was 45 million for each kilometer.

Writing a book

If you have ever thought about quitting your job and starting writing novels, then probably you have never thought about how much effort you need to apply in order to release at least one book. Even if you don’t take into account planning the structure and collecting the necessary information, then just writing the text will take a little bit less than 500 hours in general.

Strange love for books does have its own definition

Have you ever noticed yourself sniffing a book? Moreover, do you love this smell that can’t be confused with anything else? In fact, Bibliosmia is the word defined as the sniffing of books.

The secret door

Charles Dickens had a secret door in his house which led to a secret chamber. It was disguised as a bookcase, where there were fake books with fake names, such as nine chapters of The Lives of a Cat, The Art of cutting Teeth, and Jonah’s Account of the Whale.

Nerd

The word “nerd” became one of the favorite slang words among Americans. The origin of it is “If I Ran the Zoo” which was written by Dr Seuss in 1950. In other words, this means that this word is around 70 years old now.

Author is not a typist

Before writing the popular works The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, John Ronald Reuel Tolkien learned how to type. Unfortunately, his lessons weren’t successful, so he had to type with only two fingers. As you might have guessed, he typed both of his bestsellers with only two fingers, and he claimed that this activity was quite exhausting for him.

Books are not only for reading

While the whole word read, collected, or even created huge libraries with the books, some people decided to earn a Guiness Record. Nine hundred and ninety-eight people were involved, who stood and balanced the books on their heads simultaneously. It happened in Sydney in 2012.

Now, there are enough facts about the works of both favorite and less-favourite authors. All of them were collected in order to show how writers have struggles and what challenges they had to face in order to bring their pet projects to life, which you now can enjoy sitting in a comfortable chair.

Fun Facts About Reading

This final chapter serves as the best recommendations for you if you love reading and sometimes doubt whether to read or do something else. These facts will show you how good it is to read books and what they can do for you.

Alzheimer’s Disease

Alzheimer’s disease, along with Dementia, are still waters to your health, you don’t know exactly if or when it could be diagnosed in you or you relatives. Moreover, this disease develops quite slowly and you can’t always recognize it; often it happens that it’s too late to treat it, so you can only be patient with your everyday tasks. Fortunately, recent research has proved that reading will definitely decrease the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and Dementia development.

Stress

If have constant stress because of relationships, work, relatives, etc, then you should probably change your lifestyle. Don’t start with the people around you but with yourself first.

The most proper way is to read a book, which calms you down and makes your anxiety go away.

Thinking abilities

For sure, everyone knows that reading books is much better than watching an adapted version on a TV screen – it makes your imagination develop and become more able to think abstractly. Moreover, your speech and ability to speak out will become clearer and richer in vocabulary.

Subconscious knowledge

Every time you take a book and start reading, especially if it’s not a prose but technical literature, you will learn even more. For sure, you will not remember everything, but everything you read will stay in your head and you will subconsciously apply this information to your life.

Extending your memory

From the above-mentioned facts, it’s quite clear that your brain activities will likely perform quicker. Furthermore, in order to store read information and then apply it, the memory storage in your mind will extend, as well.

In other words, your memory will be more acute.

Analytical skill

People value analytical skills, especially in workers. However, if your analytical skills are not as good as you want – that’s not bad! The only thing you need is to read more! Yes, books develop your brain performance and, as a result, you will likely develop the ability to analyze as well.

Focusing

The same as with stress, reading works as the best tool to relieve your anxiety and restlessness. As an advantage, you will train your ability to focus and concentrate on a particular thing for some time, even if there are people and noise around.

Writing

Despite the increased vocabulary that will help you to say everything more beautifully and clearly, in writing, this will work vice versa. Yes, you will write less, BUT you will write more effectively, clearly, with less unnecessary information. In fact, numerous managers adore reports arranged in a short and easy to understand way.

Inner peace

In addition to the book’s ability to calm you down when you are in a rush and you are anxious about something, a book may contain particular information that will soothe your anxiety. Furthermore, you may find the needed information that you have been looking for a long time.

If you don’t know what to read next

For sure, everyone has faced a situation when they are eager to read something, but they don’t know what to start with. In fact, some people do have bigger problems than this one; they are afraid of running out of reading something. This fear has its own definition: Abibliophobia.

Waste your time with pleasure

If often happens that you need to wait for something or someone, and time passes too slowly. A mobile or a tablet cannot be an option, since the battery can run out of power.

In this case, the best problem solver is a book, which doesn’t take much space in your bag and it’s not too heavy to carry.

World’s education

Some of the educational systems in the world are far from being the best; however, some countries still do have a problem with people’s illiteracy. 20% of the world’s population can’t write or read. The worst indexes are in Asia and Africa.

Now you see how books can help you to improve your body and mental health. Books are universal and unique things that can be used for various purposes. For sure, the way you use it (except reading) is also unique, and probably will appreciate this way, too.

References