Over at Contentions John Podhoretz warns that “the end of the physical book may be coming hard upon us faster than anyone ever anticipated.” I don’t think so.
I appreciate your points about the 'aura' of printed books. There is no substitute for it in electronic versions. However, electronic books are ideally suited to re-reading, since you can carry your entire library with you wherever you go, and in addition the electronic format lends books an interesting timeless or ever-present quality which makes it especially inviting to return to the classics. The main problem is a gap in what is available covering much of mid to late C20th literature. Prior to that it is available free from gutenberg, and recent fiction is already in ebook format. For example, I doubt if there's much Christina Stead in ebook form, but if there was there would be readers for it.
I appreciate your points about the 'aura' of printed books. There is no substitute for it in electronic versions. However, electronic books are ideally suited to re-reading, since you can carry your entire library with you wherever you go, and in addition the electronic format lends books an interesting timeless or ever-present quality which makes it especially inviting to return to the classics.
ReplyDeleteThe main problem is a gap in what is available covering much of mid to late C20th literature. Prior to that it is available free from gutenberg, and recent fiction is already in ebook format.
For example, I doubt if there's much Christina Stead in ebook form, but if there was there would be readers for it.
"you can carry your entire library with you wherever you go"
ReplyDeleteI can't seem to recall the last time I was truly inconvenienced because I didn't have my entire library with me.