# The Book Club: James Marriott

An episode of [Best of the Spectator](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/793236670), 2 Sep 2026, 41 min.

Audio: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/open/s/68358fb5e1abc4be6b0308eb/e/6a9707273e79af5f4879fdae/media.mp3?tk=eyJ0ayI6ImRlZmF1bHQiLCJhZHMiOnRydWUsInNwb25zIjp0cnVlLCJzdGF0dXMiOiJwdWJsaWMifQ==&sig=KEg69y8v5LhOTKVwKjUiAfIgt8B7KVa4mHlZEUjNlQ8

In this week’s Book Club podcast, Sam Leith is joined by The Times columnist James Marriott, whose new book is The New Dark Ages: The End of Reading and the Dawn of a Post-literate Society. Are we witnessing the end of the reading age? James explains why literacy has shaped not just our culture but the way we think – and why its decline could have profound consequences for politics, democracy and public life. They discuss how television, TikTok and short-form video have transformed our attention spans, whether AI will further erode the status of writing, and why the readers of the future may become a new cognitive elite. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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