Recently published by “Question” Publishing House in Beirut, the book “They Read Until They Became Stupid: A Plea Against Stupidity” by Bahraini critic and academic Dr. Nader Kazem. The book is a multi-faceted plea against stupidity, against its most prominent forms and manifestations from the nineteenth century until today, and against those who stand behind its popularization in order to turn people into idiots in all possible ways, even through reading.The book consists of 15 chapters, which address the subject of reading from a cultural perspective, and raise many questions about it, as it is a basis for knowledge, and as it may sometimes be a subject for the production of stupidity. It is not always a means of progress, but rather it may become one of the means of reproducing backwardness, both personal and collective, not only reading, but also writing. This is evident in the titles of some chapters, such as “Writing for money produces nothing but nonsense,” and “The Star Writer, and the Meteor Writer,” indicating that some writers light up quickly.And they go out quickly. It also discusses in other chapters pressing cultural topics in the Arab cultural and literary reality, such as “The culture industry and mass deception,” and “Has the novel become the opium of the people?”
Nader Kadhim, who currently works as a professor of cultural studies at the University of Bahrain, has many publications, including “Representations of the Other,” “Identity and Narrative,” “Uses of Memory,” “Outside the Group,” “The Sheikh and Enlightenment,” “Uncontrolled Hate,” and other books concerned with critical theory and cultural studies.
