Stephen Fry launches campaign to boost reading for pleasure

The Hay festival president is asking readers for book recommendations that will ‘entice the most reluctant reader’ to help combat the decline in leisure reading

Hay festival president Stephen Fry is backing the organisation’s new campaign to collect recommendations for the most pleasurable books to entice new readers, in a bid to combat falling literacy rates in the UK.

The Pleasure List campaign, run in partnership with the government’s National Year of Reading 2026, will share the “most un-put-downable” reads in the hopes of helping reverse the downward trend of adults reading for pleasure.