3084 2025 eng article Wiley-VCH 0 -- 2025-08-21 -- Engineering work is much less solid and much airier than often assumed. And precisely for this reason, another rather airy activity is a good training for it: namely the reading of novels. I argue for two benefits of novel reading: first, reading exercises skills central to engineering design, such as imagination and fictionality competence; second, it trains the ethical capabilities of the reader, e.g., the ability of taking over other person's perspectives. These benefits are illustrated by using the examples of different novels in which the focus is laid especially on sustainability topics. Lastly, some uses of novels in engineering education are briefly discussed. Chemie Ingenieur Technik (CIT) 0009-286X 10.1002/cite.12011 true {"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,2]],"date-time":"2025-08-02T14:39:46Z","timestamp":1754145586594,"version":"3.41.2"},"reference-count":36,"publisher":"Wiley","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,6,8]],"date-time":"2025-06-08T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1749340800000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["onlinelibrary.wiley.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Chemie Ingenieur Technik"],"abstract":"<jats:title>Abstract<\/jats:title><jats:p>Engineering work is much less solid and much airier than often assumed. And precisely for this reason, another rather airy activity is a good training for it: namely the reading of novels. I argue for two benefits of novel reading: first, reading exercises skills central to engineering design, such as imagination and fictionality competence; second, it trains the ethical capabilities of the reader, e.g., the ability of taking over other person's perspectives. These benefits are illustrated by using the examples of different novels in which the focus is laid especially on sustainability topics. Lastly, some uses of novels in engineering education are briefly discussed.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1002\/cite.12011","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,6,8]],"date-time":"2025-06-08T22:55:19Z","timestamp":1749423319000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1002\/crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Why Engineers Should Read More Novels"],"prefix":"10.1002","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-9226-1480","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Michael","family":"Kuhn","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Rosenheim Technical University of Applied Sciences Faculty of Management and Engineering Hochschulstr.\u00a01 83024 Rosenheim Germany"}]}],"member":"311","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,6,8]]},"reference":[{"key":"e_1_2_7_2_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"W. G.Vincenti What Engineers Know and How They Know It. 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