LITERARY FACTS:
Here you'll find some points on a few well-known books, stats and interesting facts; some, you may already know, but I love interesting facts. Particularly fact number 25, if it's true. I really hope it is.
1. The first public library in America was opened in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1698.
2. The Bible is the best-selling nonfiction book of all time. Since 1815, more than 2.5 billion copies have been sold worldwide. It has been translated into more than 2,200 languages and dialects.
3. The youngest female author was Dorothy Straight. She was only 4 when she wrote How the World Began, in 1964, for her grandmother.
4. R.L Stine, author of the 'Goosebumps' series, has sold the most children's books in that genre out of any other author.
5. The first book printed in English, in 1475, was The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye. by Englishman William Caxton.
6. All of the roles in Shakespeare's plays were originally acted by men and boys. In England at that time, it wasn't proper for females to appear on stage.
7. Bilbo Baggins was born on September 22 1290.
8. Dr. Seuss wrote "Green Eggs and Ham" after his editor dared him to write a book using fewer than 50 different words.
9. Sherlock Holmes never said 'Elementary, my dear Watson.'
10. Harvard has some books bound in human skin. YUP. And for your information, none of them is the Necronomicon.
11. Detective Sherlock Holmes, created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is the most portrayed character of all times according to the Guinness World Records.
12. Reading makes you smarter, and boosts your analytical thinking skills as well.
13. The first novel written on a typewriter is said to be Mark Twain's Adventures Of Tom Sawyer.
14. Jane Austen originally gave the name ‘First Impressions’ to her book which was later published as ‘Pride and Prejudice’.
15. A survey in 2013 reported that 18 per cent of people never read printed books.
17. JRR Tolkien is said to have typed the whole of Lord of the Rings using only two fingers.
18. In 2014, officials in the Polish town of Tuszyn banned Winnie-the-Pooh on the grounds that the bear was of ‘dubious sexuality’, ‘half-naked’ and ‘inappropriately dressed’.
19. Only 1 in 4 parents easily find the opportunity to read to their children.
20. Research suggests that regular reading is associated with a 35% reduction in the risk of dementia.
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21. Fiction books increase your ability to empathise with others.
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22. There are over 129 million books in existence (from 2010).
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23. 'Bibliosmia' is the love of the smell of old books.
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24. The longest sentence ever printed is from Victor Hugo's 'Les Miserables', weighting at 823 words.
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25. J.R.R. Tolkien was apparently known to dress up as an axe-wielding Anglo-Saxon warrior and chase his astonished neighbour down the street
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