Reading to cats

My little brother (not so little anymore) is almost nine years younger than I. Not just I, but also others in the family read all kinds of books and stories to him when he was small ... and a little bigger ... he'll admit himself that he was not an avid reader as a child because he just enjoyed being read to.
And although I would never have admitted that at the time, I now think I rather enjoyed reading to him except for the few times when I really had had other plans like watching a movie for example.

Have you ever read a sentence five times and still didn't know what you've read because your brain seemed to keep wandering off elsewhere - what do I still have to do today, what will I wear tomorrow, why do flies fly so erratically, where did I know the actress in the movie yesterday from or simply why are the people around me so loud ...
Reading something aloud can help us with our attention span and with processing what we read.
It activates our brain in different ways which can enhance comprehending and memorizing a text.

I have always been talking to myself on and off since I was a kid. To make the walk home from my friend's house less boring for example, I either read a book while walking or I made up little stories that I told myself whispering (I stopped if someone dared to walk close to me).
There are things at home I have to comment on while doing them. Sometimes I read an email out loud during drafting it to see if it makes sense and if I have covered everything.
When studying, I read something out loud if I had a problem to grasp it.
Eventually I started reading from books to myself every, now and then, a paragraph or even a chapter, but never a whole book.
Also, whenever one of my pets was sick and I held them in my arm, I read to them to comfort them. That began with Wurstel, my rabbit. I remember it like today, the only book that was in reach that day was Rübezahl, tales about a mountain spirit.

Then, about one and a half years ago, I started reading to my cats just for fun. I had sometimes done that before as well, little snippets here and there - because yes, I do talk to my cats and no, I have not started that since living on my own - but now I was doing it regularly.
Our first book was "At Christmas we feast : festive food through the ages" by British food historian Annie Gray. At first it was like "would you calm down now, come on, I'll read something to you", but I noticed I actually enjoyed doing it, and believe it or not, I felt the cats enjoyed listening. Okay, of course they did fall asleep eventually and I still read on until the chapter was finished, but yeah, it had something relaxing. 

You think that's ridiculous? A friend I told about it when we were talking about books laughed and asked me why I would think the cats enjoyed that.
Of course I would like to say now that they love my exquisite choice of literature and my talents as a reader, but that would truly be humoring myself. Our reading can only be called eclectic and my reading talents would definitely not qualify me for audiobooks.
Depending on the day I had, the temperatures, my level of tiredness or restlessness, and some other factors, I can be quite a good reader or a terrible one whose tongue gets twisted every few words.

You may wonder why I don't just participate in a reading program for children at the local library or find a group for shared reading if I like reading out loud.

There are several reasons.
Gundel and der Dekan are extremely understanding on my tongue twisting days. They don't complain if I skip a word, say a wrong one or if I struggle with the pronunciation for a second. You must know I usually read English books to them. For some reason it has always been more relaxing to me to read English out loud and German silently even before I read to the cats.
It's like a bedtime story meaning I do it before we go to sleep for the night. We don't read during the day. Well, I do, but silently. By now it feels like a good way to wind down, calm down and sometimes even sleep better (until one of the brats wakes me up for "breakfast" at 3 a.m.) or quicker. We usually do a chapter, sometimes more, rarely less, but there are no rules. The other day Gundel was lying in my arm purring while I petted her and read aloud. I think they pick up on my relaxation and they like that.

Excuse the bad pictures, but it's very hard to take one holding a camera up over your head and aiming blindly at something behind you.
When lying on the bed, I like to throw my hair back over the pillow to get it out of the way. Gundel settled in for our reading session - on my hair. Until der Dekan decided he wanted the spot, chased her off and it took a bit before we could go on reading.

They don't judge my reading choices. We've read about eating habits during Queen Victoria's time, we've read The Three Investigators books, we've read children's books, vintage crime, at the moment we alternate between a book about craft psychology and a biography about a crime author, we might add another volume from the Three Investigators.
I can choose time, duration, and book. Granted, there isn't much verbal feedback or discussion 😋, but that's fine by me. Is it slower, too? Of course it is, but we pick books accordingly.

Reading to animals isn't unusual, by the way. Shelters have discovered the benefits of reading to animals to help them deal with stress in the shelter environment.
There are loads of programs for children reading to mostly dogs, but also cats. These programs also help children to improve their reading - again, pets are very forgiving about mistakes - and concentration.
You have probably seen some of those heartwarming of about children at home reading to their pets, too.
Why should that only be useful for children, though? Isn't it more that adults are embarrassed about doing something like this? And even talking about it?

People also read out loud to one another and feel a bit embarrassed about it. I would definitely want to be the reader in something like that because I'm not a fan of audiobooks and don't know if I would like having someone else reading to me even if I knew them well.

Are you a silent reader or do you like to read aloud, too?


Selected sources:

1. Do Pets Like Being Read To? The Surprising Benefits of Reading to Your Furry Friends. On: Doggie Dude Ranch and the O'Cat Corral
2. Sarah Manavis: Read me a story: why reading out loud is a joy for adults as well as kids. In: The Guardian (archive of The Observer), May 5, 2024
3. Regina Mennig: Shared Reading - Literature for All. On the Robert-Bosch-Stiftung website, July 2018