Rob Riemen's (Netherlands, 1962) latest book is full of great names in the history of thought. George Orwell, Simone Weil, and Thomas Mann appear, but not in grand, ponderous texts on philosophy, but rather through a series of stories that are more reminiscent of oral tradition, tales that parents, grandparents, and teachers might tell us from a young age. Through them, Riemen champions humanism, classical European culture, and the word to combat fascism. The word that conquers death (Arcadia) is, in his own words, an essay on what true greatness is.

Dear readers of this column, I hope you had a good summer. Like most of you, I suppose, it seemed short to me. I've also read less than I thought I would, but I did devour one of the books I mentioned in my last article before the holidays: James, of Percival Everett (Ángulo, translated by Jordi Martín Lloret). It is very good to recover it now, as some friends have asked me if I would dedicate this first article to the controversy of the influencer María Pombo for his statements about reading.

This summer will be remembered for the extreme heat, the fires, and the massacres. But each of us will have our own particular summer, transformed into a refuge for memory. More or less everyone in our first world is now returning to routine. It's noticeable in the streets. We're already connected. Disconnecting, which we did much more when summers were analog, is practically impossible in digital times. Some people tune out the news because it's bad and it affects them. In summer and all year round. Others do it because it doesn't interest them. Everything is permissible. How can you not read books? says a woman who makes videos on social media And it's also news. Because there are those who don't want to know anything but want to know everything about those contemporary gurus who trap them in the social cobwebs. Neither are better at liking to read, nor others worse at spending the day watching TikTok videos. Among other reasons because being better or worse can't be summed up in a weekly article. And I'll leave it here because I prefer to flee, which rhymes with reading, from that topic like I do from the heat.

With more than three million followers, María Pombo is one of the influencers most famous in the Spanish state. That's why, whether she likes it or not, anything she does or any interaction she has on social media becomes news. This week, the youngest of the Pombo sisters—all of them influencers– has gone viral for making a derogatory comment about reading enthusiasts. In a video posted yesterday on TikTok, Pombo said: "I think we need to start getting over the fact that there are people who don't like to read and that you're no better at making them like reading." The Madrid native was responding to a follower's comment about Pombo's bookshelf, which the influencer He had dedicated a video to it. "The bookstore is beautiful, but if it were full of books that have been read, it would be even more so. Now, all I see is junk," said this follower.