Emma Watson is taking a year off to read ‘a book a week’, which sounds nice

Everyday tedium gets in the way of intellectual accomplishment: it is hard to improve the mind when it is involved in the quotidian business of getting your life in order.

Those who can, escape – Harry Potter actress Emma Watson is planning to take a year-long sabbatical to read books and study feminism. Which sounds nice.

She told Paper magazine that she is “taking a year away from acting to focus on my personal development… To read a book a week, and also to read a book a month as part of my book club.

“I’m doing a huge amount of reading and study just on my own. I almost thought about going and doing a year of gender studies, then I realised that I was learning so much by being on the ground and just speaking with people and doing my reading.”

As Hermione Granger, she represented a version of girl power for the millennial generation, and she explains that she first called herself a “feminist” right at the very beginning  of the whole Harry Potter circus:

“During my first-ever Harry Potter conference, I said I was a ‘bit of a feminist’! Ha! I think I was scared to go the full hog. I was scared I didn’t understand what it meant. I obviously did, I was just so bemused by all the chatter around the idea.”

Watson also wants to get more involved in the UN’s HeForShe campaign for gender equality.

It’s an academic approach. Hopefully she won’t forget that a lot of feminism involves tackling the everyday tedium and that business of getting your life in order.