| Some days, for whatever reason, it’s hard to feel much pleasure. We look for it in all kinds of places, some more promising than others. But an option that virtually everyone can access, cheaply and at any time, is reading, an activity whose therapeutic qualities can be easy to overlook. In “Can Reading Make You Happier?,” from 2015, the author Ceridwen Dovey examines the science and history of literature as a mental-health remedy, tracing it as far back as the ancient Greeks. In Dovey’s own life, she reveals, she has worked successfully with a “bibliotherapist,” someone who “prescribes” different sorts of books to treat different types of challenges. Not everyone agrees that literature changes readers’ own behavior, but the evidence for certain psychological benefits seems clear. As for what specifically to read, the article mentions materials ranging from self-help guides to Jane Austen—almost anything, sometimes, but the news of the day. | 
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