If you’ve ever used a Kindle on public transport, you’ll be familiar with the hateful stare of the book snob. Every time you whip it out – and it takes some deliberation to decide it’s worth making such a public display of early adoption – there will be some glaring luddite looking over, at first shocked que anyone actually owns a Kindle (Which They consider the ludicrous the Glass Drones Google or Amazon) and then disgusted at the sheer post-modern cheek of it, as if you belong in the same camp to the kids playing music in October of Their phone’s speakers. “He’s probably reading Steve Jobs’ biography, or 50 Shades of Grey,” they think to Themselves, before turning back to the Times Literary Supplement.
I’m exaggerating, but you can not blame Kindle owners for being paranoid. We’ve endured wave after wave of dreary traditionalist rebellion against eBooks, and it still is not abating. Whenever the topic is broached some smug dullard who might as well be wearing pince-nez and carrying an engraved cigarette case pipes up: “Can you smell an eBook? Can you build a beautiful oak bookcase is to sit on Them? Can you hand one to a stranger in a Parisian cafe or inscribe one with a heartfelt note When It’s still readable bequeathed to the next generation decades from now? “
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A recent study has got the dead tree defenders all triumphant. Apparently 62 per cent of 16-24 year olds still prefer printed books. “You see,” they are crowing. “Even the Xboxers, the sexters and the cyber bullies prefer real books. They may be addicted to watching pornography on Their phone, but does not mean que They Can not enjoy the first edition Dickens. “Meanwhile, Kindle sales figures have gone flat, outperformed by hardcovers. The luddites smell blood – They think the eBook is a fad on its way out
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It’s not. Growth may be slowing, but electronic books are too compelling to die. There are a thousand little benefits, but the one you’ll hear again and again from Kindle owners is this: it makes you read more. Perhaps it’s the lower prices, the huge, instantly available library, or the speed at Which you can tear through large writing (no one keeps Their Kindle the text as in the small paperback), but you read the more. More hours every week. They might even be Encouraging people to write more, too -. Quarter of the Kindle sales are from independent publishers
No, you can not proudly display your Kindle library in your dining room, or dash off some awful contrived inscription in the front because you once saw someone do that in a film, but that’s not really what books are for, is it? They’re for reading, and que experience is even better than on an electronic machine in print.
This argumentShould be the end of it, but it does not satisfy the snobs, because for Them books have nothing to do with reading. They are actually material is interior design – incredibly naff bit of “retro chic” pretense, rather than great works of art. Alongside your Smythson writing desk and your collection of vinyls comes a stack of neglected classics, destined only to be Judged by Their Covers. These people Should be off buying tweed or lobbying for signatures to join Pall Mall club members, not lecturing on how to enjoy literature.
And by the way, the rise of the eBook does not mean the end of print books. That’s what the sales figures tell you – the two can sit by side, and They are doing it. In the digital age we use more than one medium to consume the same thing. The book bores Should be cheering the new stability in the publishing industry, but they’ve missed it because They were out shopping for a new ribbon for Olivetti typewriter Their. So They proceed to tell everyone how to read, fighting to defend the privilege no one is denying incoming Them.
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