It is opined by some that reading is superior to watching TV when it comes to fostering creativity. Personally, I totally postulate with this viewpoint because of the underlying rationales.
To begin with, reading raises the need for self visualization. In the majority of books, few to no photos are provided to visualize the scenarios. Accordingly, in order to fully immerse in the story, readers have to illustrate the storyline inside their mind, which promotes creativity. Television, on the other hand, offers illustration with tailored made scenes. Therefore, understandably, the viewers do not need to rack their brains to grasp the sense of how everything can happen. Gradually, it can become challenging for TV enthusiasts to imagine about plain incidents without any aiding tools.
Another contributing factor is the absence of biased views in reading. Specifically, TV shows or movies are made through the lens of the directors, hence imposing on watchers’ minds a quite altered image of a character or scenario. For instance, in Harry Potter, Ron Weasley is mainly portrayed as a cowardly boy who can even leave his friends to run away from enemies and trivial issues. However, with words described in the original novel by J.K.Rowling, most of ‘PotterHead’ agree that Ron not only displayed the bravery through the chess game in chapter two, but also was a warm-hearted boy who was not at all hesitant to sacrifice for Harry Potter in the ending chapter. Briefly, the words allow individuals to have varied angles and judgments of a specific event under no influence of others, hence enhancing imagination.
The last but not least notable reason is the timing. Specifically, readers are given more time to delve into the certain intriguing aspects and indulge in their own chains of thoughts. Conversely, regardless of a movie’s pace, TV watchers are granted no pauses to give a thorough thought to what has happened. In other words, normally, they have to move to other scenes, even before truly digesting the previous scenarios and shaping their own viewpoints. Therefore, literally there is no room for creativity.
To sum up, reading has more profound effects on imaginative thinking thanks to the abovementioned factors. Consequently, it is advisable for TV fans to allocate time for reading so as to reinforce imagination.