After many years of oblivion, the book again becomes a fashionable attribute in the hands of a person who wants to be considered an intellectual. Of course, today's popularity of literature cannot be compared with the reading boom of the fifties, sixties, seventies and eighties, when children sometimes had to tear themselves away from the adventures of their beloved heroes, but there is a logical explanation for that. There were then no tablets, laptops and other computer wonders, and on TV they rarely showed something fascinating. The question of what is being read today in Russia and in the world requires a detailed answer. Different books have a target ... they cannot be called an audience, audio is when they listen. In general, the reader is different for different genres, but they are all good, except for the boring one, as the classic said.
Classic
It is still popular, moreover, its scope has expanded significantly. Her writers included those who quite recently (in the historical sense, of course) were classified as fiction. To the contemporaries of Jack London or Antosha Chekhonte, who lived at the beginning of the twentieth century, these wonderful plot masters and words seemed ordinary people, contemporaries who successfully applied their talent (or even just abilities) in order to earn their daily bread. A.P. Chekhov himself believed that reading and staging his works in the theater would be at most a few years, but they would forget there. Fortunately, the classic was mistaken. His stories and stories are successful today, they are more popular than most of the works of modern authors, those that are read today. The rating of classical literature is headed by him, and not only in Russia, but also in many other countries (in Japan, for example), where, in addition to selling books, they often stage plays based on his plays, treating them differently each time. The inhabitants of the planet are also not indifferent to Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Dreiser, London, Dickens, Bulgakov. A few of the most popular names are among the ten favorite writers, but in different countries they occupy different positions. Classics are most often read from paper, so interesting.
Criteria
Evaluating the most read books today is difficult. For this, different methods are used, the main of which is considered to be circulation. This method of analysis is of the greatest practical importance, especially for publishers and printing houses interested in the highest possible sales volumes of their products. However, this approach has an approximate relationship with the true state of affairs. A book in our time is not an expensive thing, and today it can be safely attributed to a truly “best present”, with which one is not ashamed to come for a birthday or anniversary. Therefore, the print edition is often loaned to friends and acquaintances who do not want to spend money on such an expensive thing, and often one-time. Home libraries today are rare people, volumes occupy a valuable place in the home, and there is also the Internet where you can find almost everything, at least what they read today. The rating is sought there, so as not to get confused in the huge stream of modern and classical literature. So many do, drive texts into tablets and read everywhere, on buses, trams and the subway.
Read rate
The circulation of the publication is established by an official called a publisher; often he makes a decision based on his own ideas about how successful the project will be.
Another criterion by which literary ratings and lists of the best books are compiled is a simple arithmetic addition of the number of hits on the author’s page on the Internet, if any, of course. To do this, the creators of sites install software counters that mark each visitor. The disadvantage of this method is the inferiority of information. It is not known whether the work was read in full, or simply glanced over it and then closed it. In addition, it is impossible to count all readers due to the fact that the same story can be presented on different sites, sometimes, alas, without the knowledge of the author, and not all of them have a cumulative counting function. The number of downloads is also not always taken into account, and material rewards in this case are very rare.
What women read
The beautiful half of humanity more often than men is friends with a book. What excites women, what do they like and what do they read today? The rating of the ten works most popular among ladies is closed by Eduard Asadov, a true poet and writer who praised true love. For half a century, the number of fans of his talent has not decreased, but increased. In ninth place - a seemingly childish book called “The Little Princess, or the Story of Sarah Crewe” by Francis Burnett. The narrative is naive only at first glance, and mothers, introducing their daughters to him, themselves fall under the spell of the heroine's immediacy. Detectives of Ustinova are a bit more likely to buy, Cecilia Ahern and even the best-selling book Devil Wears Prada, Lauren Weisberger, take even higher levels. Further up the ladder of popularity are Joanna Lindsay, Tatyana Polyakova (again, female detectives) and Sophie Kinsella with their "Secret World of Shopaholic". Top positions are taken by Stephanie Meyer with a story about the love of a vampire (Twilight) and the psychological novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Perhaps the closing positions are specific for Russian literature lovers, but the top ones completely repeat the rating of the most read books in the world among women.
What do men like?
If we discard money-obsessed entrepreneurs (who more often become characters in novels than their consumers) and representatives of the stronger sex who have an extremely low level of intelligence, then the rest of the not-so-large male brethren would also like to spend their free time turning over pages. Which of the works for them are the most popular books and the most read? A lot of books of courageous subjects have been written. These are J. London, and E.M. Remarque, and historical chronicles, and military-technical literature. Men read everything from Hemingway to Stephen King, but as a rule, they don’t endure specific female novels. However, there are exceptions. Women sometimes too, in fairness, gladly indulge in pleasure with a book considered exclusively male.
Children
Children, as already mentioned, read a little now, and the author needs to put a lot of effort together with talent in order to interest them with something. And in this case it doesn’t matter how deep the thoughts of such a work are, as in general, what they read. Today, the rating of teenagers and literature is headed by the books of Alexander Anderson, "Alex and Coins" and "All the Most Favorite Tales" by Gregory Oster. In addition to them, fairy tales, novels and sagas in the style of fantasy are popular (roughly like fiction in the past). It is possible to analyze the reasons why life in a fictional world for the younger generation is more interesting than real, for a long time, but this is the prose of life, and we must reckon with it, which is what publishers interested in the profitability of their activities do. Some consolation is the declining popularity of Harry Potter. And absolutely happy with the nostalgic return to eternal values, expressed in the “Murzilka Archive”, published in two volumes (from 1966 to 1974).
Humor
Laughing literature is the hardest genre. Squeezing a tear from the reader is much easier than making him even smile. A modern book lover with pleasure reads Zhvanetsky, especially the early one, pays tribute to Ilya Ilf and Yevgeny Petrov and is interested in contemporary authors. I was pleased with the book with the intriguing title “Plumber. Yours is my knee ”by author Se Slava (obviously a pseudonym). Previously, this material was published on popular blogs, and now came out "live". At the moment, these are the most read books in Russia on a humorous topic, and it is up to the people to decide how to place them on the prize steps.
Parables
In our country, as well as abroad, a large stratum of lovers of philosophical literature has formed. This is not about some serious scientific research (there is also a demand for them). These most read books in Russia in their genre are designed to encourage a person to think about eternal values, escape from worldly vanity and, if possible, gain wisdom consecrated for centuries. These include the “Prophet" by Khalil Djibran, the paternal teachings of the holy elders, instructive polemics of Kuraev and the like literature. Sales ratings do not give a real picture of the popularity of these publications. It is possible that someone acquires them in order to put them on the shelf in order to create the image of an intellectual person, in other cases they are read out literally to holes. Presenting such a book as a gift, it should be remembered that only a thoughtful person, inclined to abstract thinking, will really be happy with it .
Fashion literature
There is such a moody and windy lady, who is called fashion. Most often, it is found in branded boutiques and car dealerships, but sometimes it is also found in bookstores. A number of authors, having created a work, strive for scandalous fame, and achieve it by various methods. They generously saturate the characters' speech with profanity, trying to give originality to the images, choose stories about cannibals, lunatics, drug addicts and other unsightly audiences, trying to surprise rather than please. On a rather short period of time, sellers tell the buyer that these are the most read books in Russia. Today they are one authors, tomorrow others, and their series does not dry up. It happens that the novels really have certain artistic merits, but the fashion writers, holding their nose in the wind of the conjunction, rarely create masterpieces.
The reader is left to evaluate his spiritual needs and choose his own among the vast sea of literature.