A brief history of the summer beach read
Though the term “beach read” wasn’t popularized until the 1990s, the concept has existed for so long that it can seem like easy breezy pleasure reading while on summer holiday has simply always been. In fact, it has a distinct history that can be traced back to the early 1800s.
In ”Books for Idle Hours: Nineteenth Century Publishing and the Rise of Summer Reading,” English and communications scholar Donna Harrington-Lueker writes that in the early 1800s, many well-heeled Americans began taking time off in the summer to travel by railroad or steamship to idyllic destinations like Niagara Falls or the Catskills. Within a century, the concept had caught on even with middle- and working-class people, who would at least take respite in the form of day trips to the beach. Vacation as a reward for hard work became a thing.
In 1853, Ticknor, Reed and Fields published “A Book for the Sea-Side,” a collection of ocean-themed poetry which included work by William Wordsworth and others. Then, in 1872, The Book Buyer, a trade journal from the Charles Scribner publishing house, ran its first ads for titles explicitly labeled as “summer reading,” planting the idea that certain books are best enjoyed while on a loll.
Soon, every summer featured lists of intellectually light lift novels.
In a blog post for JSTOR, the digital library of academic journals and research, Livia Gershon writes that an 1899 review “saw the value of these books in that they could be ‘taken up and laid down without fear of losing the trend of anything in it’ and were ‘calculated to keep on in good humor under almost any circumstance.’”
What defines a beach read?
While beach reads are often thought of as strictly the realm of the romance novel, and mass-market paperbacks — which originated in the 1930s — geared toward women readers, enjoyable tomes that don’t tax the respite-seeking reader come in all shapes and forms.
A beach read is simply writing that is entertaining and easily digestible, usually something that can be read quickly — devoured in a session or two under the shade of an umbrella, and is easy enough to put down for a dip in the pool, and then resume again. Think Sally Rooney, not Fyodor Dostoyevsky (though I’ll mention braggily that I brought “The Brothers Karamazov” on one summer vacation; really, any book can be a beach read if the person reading finds ready pleasure in it).
Anything featured in Oprah’s Book Club or Reese Witherspoons’ is a safe bet for relaxing and unwinding with a page-turner. The genre isn’t what defines this category, though classic iterations often include a romance and meta storylines set in resort towns and dreamy locales that mimic the lifestyles of the upper classes when they’re out of office, presumably engaged in pleasure reading. Beach reads span various bookstore sections; they can fall into the categories of romance, thriller, mystery, fantasy and historical fiction.
What is the appeal of light summer reading?
Reading for pure enjoyment makes perfect sense as a way to rest and divert the mind while spending time away from work and daily worries. And as Harrington-Lueker writes in her book on the subject, escapist plots are especially appealing during periods of turmoil and strife in the world.
A magazine column in 1885 called that year’s batch of summer novels “peculiarly trivial,” but added that there might be good reason for that; perhaps publishers had anticipated “unusually high rates of cholera” and believed “that the general mind will be so far distraught by anxiety as to have no attention to spare for being critical.”
Related
With today’s readers facing all manner of calamities, from the pandemic to climate change; the Russian invasion of Ukraine; mass layoffs in tech, media and other industries; and all manner of distressing news and hardships, this summer is prime time for indulging in whatever fanciful, fun fiction your heart desires, and not feel an ounce of remorse.
Is there a case to be made against beach reads? The backlash against trivial reading
Throughout history, there’s always been opposition to any new form of entertainment or style of amusement, be it jazz, comic books or the concept of frivolous novels. In an 1876 sermon, a Brooklyn preacher named the Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage warned that paperback romance novels were “literary poison.” “Do not let the frogs and the lice of a corrupt printing press jump and crawl into your Saratoga trunk of White Mountain valise,” he said, “... there is more pestiferous trash read among the intelligent classes in July and August than in all the other ten months of the year.”
There’s also a school of thought that one should challenge themselves, even in the summer. Some people go out of their way to do the opposite of beach reading, opting instead to read chewy, intellectually stimulating books that require patience and deep focus, something that isn’t always possible in the day to day, while working and running a household. There’s less mental energy to devote to reading in the everyday, so they argue that the best time to crack open a rigorous work of literature is when your feet are in the sand.
However, in the beach read’s defense, in 1887, “The Book Buyer” editorialized that “the cakes and ale of literature have their legitimate time and place after the more solid intellectual dishes of the past season have been digested.”
What are some classic novels to read by the beach this summer?
1. ”The Secret History” by Donna Tartt
It’s hard not to be totally enraptured by this melancholic and broody mystery that follows a tight knit group of tony classics students at a small, elite liberal arts college in Vermont. You’ll fly through the Greek tragedy-inspired book that slowly reveals the events that led up to the murder of one of the friends at the center of the drama.
2. ”The Virgin Suicides” by Jeffrey Eugenides
This dark, dreamy novel set in suburban mid-’70s Detroit is pink and airy, despite its macabre content. From a distance, just like the boy narrators, you’ll fall in love with the five comely Lisbon sisters with their long blond hair (if you’ve seen the movie based on this book, it’s hard not to picture young Kirsten Dunst) and mysterious, moody dissatisfaction. Why they all die, one by one, is a breadcrumb trail character study that drives you to keep reading.
3. ”The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency” by Alexander McCall
Penned by a Scottish author who was raised in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), his beloved series revolves around Detective Mma Precious Ramotswe and her assistant, who investigate minor crimes in their small Botswana town. McCall has been publishing new adventures in the series since 1998, so once you’ve enjoyed one title, there’s always another to reach for. The adventures of the lady detectives are wholesome and heartwarming — they make for perfect beach reads because the problems typically have tidy solutions that make sense and are emotionally satisfying.
