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Good morning.

Maggie Cole from Dorset, 7 years old, was somewhat disgruntled, it seems, to see a Superhero alarm clock displayed in a Tesco’s store under the words ‘Fun Gifts for Boys’. Her mother said that Maggie has always been keen on superheroes, dragons and the like and thought that the alarm clock would make a fun gift for both girls and boys – and Tesco agreed, admitted their mistake, and removed the sign.

But if toys are just toys and not toys for boys – or girls for that matter - what about books? I ask that question because a survey published by the reading website Goodreads shows a stark gender divide in our reading habits. Of the 50 books published this year and most popular with women, only five were by men – and one of those men was a certain Robert Galbraith, aka J.K. Rowling. The figures for male readers are much the same, but the other way round – men have been reading books mostly by men.

I am glad that Maggie Cole won her point – girls’ expectations of what they can do or be in life shouldn’t be constrained by signs directing them away from Superhero alarm clocks, or from tractors or chemistry sets. But should we worry about there seeming to be books for men and books for women, whatever it may be which causes these choices? ‘Yes’, I would say – and mostly for the sake of the men.

There is a wonderful detail in the stories of Christ’s death and resurrection which rings true to me as a man even separated as I am by two thousand years from these events. Each of the four Gospels tells the story slightly differently, but on one point there is absolutely no disagreement – it was women who were at the tomb first on the Sunday morning following Christ’s resurrection. The women were taking the lead, that is to say, in work where women still so very often take the lead – here in relation to grieving and mourning, but more generally in relation to any sort of work which requires facing up to difficult personal issues and demands the exercise of some emotional intelligence.

The Bible is itself divided into many different books and some of these, I suspect, are more popular with men, others more popular with women, though I don’t know if a survey has been done. The book of Revelation filled with plagues, strange beasts and noisy spiritual warfare might be top with the boys – it’s about the closest you’ll get to car chase anywhere in the Bible. Maybe some of the great heartfelt poetry of the Old Testament, such as in the Song of Songs, is top with the girls. I don’t know. But though I certainly hope that my nine month old daughter chooses a superhero alarm clock in due course, if that is what she wants, if I ever have a boy, I will be hoping a lot more strongly that he takes a look at some of the books the girls prefer to read.

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