Empathy and Why Fiction Matters

Empathy and Why Fiction Matters

On March 20th, the World Happiness Report was released, and America is at an all-time low. Out of every country included in the report, the U.S. was ranked 24th, which is the lowest our country has ever fallen. Specifically, our scores in social support plummeted from 53 to 12, and positive emotions fell from 55 to 30. The reasons for this are endless; they could be anything from the current political climate to the repercussions of COVID. It’s not hard to see that this country, specifically, along with the whole world, is lacking empathy. We get mad when someone drives too slow; we see a post on the internet and need to put hate in the replies; we gossip about someone simply because we don’t like their outfit. Empathy is dwindling in modern society, but that doesn’t mean it’s gone forever. Rebuilding it is very easy, and it starts with a book.

Everyone has read fiction before. Whether it was a children’s book or a complete novel, everyone has read some kind of fiction book. Despite our constant exposure, people often fail to see the value in fiction. It’s not real, so it’s not important, right? Wrong. Fiction is endlessly valuable for a number of reasons. Of course, fiction is a wonderful tool to make an audience understand something difficult; for example, books like George Orwell’s 1984 provide a warning for what the future may hold if totalitarianism is allowed to grow. However, fiction doesn’t have to be a heavy societal commentary to have value. You could just be reading Holes by Louis Sachar and get the same mental benefits. Neurological tests have found that reading fiction books stimulates the same parts of your brain that are utilized in real situations. Not only that, but the part of your brain that controls empathy is specifically activated when reading fiction. You sympathize with the characters, and you understand their struggles and their motives. Through reading fictional stories, we develop real cognitive skills. If everyone were to read just a little bit more fiction and learn how to truly put themselves in someone else’s shoes, the world would become a much happier place.

Now that I’ve told you to read fiction, I can’t just leave you in the dust to figure out which book to pick. Often, choosing a book can be intimidating with the millions of options at your disposal. Finding the right one is hard, and it’s even harder when you feel like you need to pick something specific. As people grow older, they might feel like they need to read something more challenging or more profound, but that’s not the case. If you want to read Herman Melville’s Moby Dick then by all means you should, but you can get the same benefits and growth of empathy from reading something as simple as Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! by Mo Willems. So, in the spirit of learning empathy, here are some great books to try.

1. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck is a heart-wrenching novella about George and Lenny, two migrant workers who dream of owning a farm during the Great Depression. The two are surrounded by unempathetic people and are often the only ones who truly seem to care about others.

2. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens is the staple book for learning about empathy. Scrooge never once cared about anyone, and because of that, he’s forced to face his past, present, and future to learn just how his actions have affected others. 

3. The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins is not only a beloved series, but it does an amazing job at getting the reader to see just how hard life is for Katniss and those around her. She goes on an epic journey and discovers what the world can be like for everyone from all districts to the capital itself. With the two newest iterations in the series– The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and Sunrise on the Reaping– being from completely different points of view only serves to further this purpose. 

4. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon drops the reader right into the perspective of Christopher Boone, an autistic fifteen-year-old trying to figure out what happened to his neighbor's dead dog. In a Sherlock Holmes-esque mystery, the reader travels with Christopher and sees the world through his eyes, coming to understand his life on a deep, personal level.  

5. Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkein is arguably one of the best book series of all time. It’s a captivating fantasy story that manages to demonstrate the horrors of war right beside a bunch of hobbits singing in a tavern. The characters all have the people and things that they care about, and each one has a life of their own, one that the readers often get glimpses into. We get to see how much each character cares and what morals they follow, all while going on an epic journey to Mordor.

6. The Wild Robot by Peter Brown may be a book meant for elementary schoolers, but it is truly a masterpiece that can be enjoyed by any age level. Rozzum unit 7134, or Roz, is a robot that got shipwrecked on an island populated solely by wildlife. She learns to understand the animals there, adapting to their way of life and even growing to love them. If a robot can come to have empathy, then a human can very easily do the same.