Television: New Leaf for TV

Educators have long warned that TV has been turning the old art of reading into a closed book for the latest generation. But last week Emerson Greenaway, director of Philadelphia's Free Library, credited TV with, of all things, an improvement in reading standards. Said Greenaway: "Everybody can see mysteries, westerns and love stories on television, so when they come to the library, they ask for more serious books." Result: the library now spends more of its book-buying budget on classics, less on shallow stuff. TV, he says, has also stimulated a reading interest in famous plays, and even the quiz shows have done their bit. Thanks largely to their incentive for boning up on the answers, Greenaway maintains, the circulation of nonfiction has more than doubled in ten years.