I've written on this topic myself a number of times, both here and at home, so this is right up my alley, so to speak.

I'm sympathetic to "fetishizing ink and paper", and absolutely believe there's a meaningful experiential difference between reading a well made book and reading something on a screen made of plastic. I think it's largely aesthetic, not fully integral to the meaning or validity of the work, but that's not at all to say it's not important. Aesthetic considerations allow function to transcend and create pleasure. A teapot is merely a metal container for boiling water, but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy the experience of having tea far more when using a well designed one. So for books.

I suppose my main concern with some of the views expressed here is the notion that the advent of electronic readers must necessarily see the demise of the paper novel. Technology doesn't typically cause the outright eradication of older forms. What it does is relegate them to niches... it places them into the category of collectors items, of art pieces. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that's necessarily a fabulous solution. Nonetheless I have hope that where a market for paper-bound books exists, then so the books will exist as well. Perhaps in the future all such will be custom made, works of skill by independent bookbinders (where the content license has already been purchased as a separate item). Of course, this removes them from the hands of the general public, for the most part; this represents a loss, no doubt, perhaps a grievous one. Still, I've read dozens of books that I felt no particular attachment to, physically. These (which aren't literature, as one of the quoted authors suggests) are better suited for eBooks. Of course, there are a couple hundred volumes that I feel very strongly about, arrayed on my shelves in a way that, I admit, brings me a great deal of comfort and perhaps even happiness thereby. But do I really need them *all*? Not really.

The proposition made by this author, that distaste for the Kindle and it's ilk is a proxy for a feeling of loss of a "solid reading culture" may be accurate, but if so I think it's also misguided. Firstly, I reject the argument that reading Shakespeare on a well designed (read, not yet created, and definitely not a blackberry) eBook reader necessarily robs it of it's "truth" or "integrity" even if it does rob it of some of it's pleasure. Meanwhile I do think that such a device (characteristics of which are discussed at more length in my link above) could offer a lot of people -- people without access to scholars, for example -- far better access to literature and a greater understanding of what they're reading than they could otherwise expect. In that sense, this technology trend may well lead to a revitalized culture of literacy.

Of course, I'm speculating, but I absolutely believe that the eBook offers a lot of potential that we haven't even touched yet.

Finally, let me address this excerpt :

In another e-mail, novelist Sam Lipsyte wrote that he's "not too upset by the notion that all of our reading will be done on some device."

"The real things that will be lost will be the discoveries that can be made in a bookstore, that wonderful wandering where you find precisely what you didn't know you were looking for."

In response to Mr. Lipsyte's commentary here, I can only say the he must never have used Wikipedia. Leave to the side for now our concerns about the accuracy and reputability of Wikipedia. It is, quite simply, the most pure example of the way extensive hyperlinking can foster exploration and lead *directly* to the kind of "wonderful wandering" he describes. Granted, I'm also sympathetic to the attitude that we all spend too much time in front of our computers, but I'm not about to deny the value of these technologies. I genuinely and completely disagree with Lipsyte. I constantly find things on the internet that I didn't know I was looking for... awesome things, and things I not only never would have found out in the "real" world, but which I wouldn't have found any substitute for either. Book stores (and all stores, of course) are constrained by limitations of physical inventory space and the choices (sometimes good, sometimes extremely not) of the store's buyers. The only thing we'll lose when we lose book stores -- and I don't mean necessarily to sound dismissive of it, because it's worth finding a way to hold on to -- is whatever social, human element book browsing and shopping may still have.

Anyway, as with any new technology, I see both dangers and promise, and while I feel certain that I'll possess far fewer of the beautiful volumes that I love than I might have otherwise, I can't be totally pessimistic about a future that enables reading and, more crucially, understanding.

Reading between the lines with Kindle