Sunday, July 8, 2012

Can Ebooks Save Literature?

So, I was sitting on a patio this afternoon reading a rather large book and listening to some entrepreneurs at the next table discussing their book distribution start up.  I felt a little bad for them, as they were saying things like "Who wants to buy a book from Amazon?" and "Amazon books just come in a brown box, if we have cool packaging people will pay more!"  As someone who buys a lot of book I couldn't help but think: 1.) Me, and everyone who reads a lot, and 2.) Who the fuck cares what kind of box it comes in.  The other thing that hit me, as my arm started to get sore from holding the book and I placed it on the table to read without having to support the weight (I know I need to work out more - fuck you), was how odd it is to still be reading full books in the age of Ebooks.

I still read books, with paper and ink, I read Ebooks once in a while, but I prefer real books.  I'm a luddite and I know that when I'm old I will be a dinosaur for it, but I can't help it, and Ebook just isn't as satisfying to me.  But I totally understand the appeal of Ebooks.  They are lighter, cheaper and more convenient than conventional books.  You can buy them from anywhere, you don't need any more storage than your tablet or Ereader, and they don't weigh down your backpack when you are travelling.  So I totally get them, I just don't like them.

This afternoon it struck me that one of the best things about Ebooks is that the ones that are older than 100 years you can get for free.  Free I tells ya!!!  And I got to thinking: could this be what saves old books?  I'm a guy who really likes to read old books.  With few notable exceptions I like to read books whose authors have been dead for a long time.  I will post someday about my theories as to why, but it's not the point of this post.  So, with all these free classics floating around people must be gobbling them up, I say to myself.  Sitting outside, enjoying a beer, my mind starts wandering, I've totally given up on my book at this point, are people reading more classics now?  I thought, maybe the classics will have a renaissance,  maybe people will start discussing why Raskolnikov felt he could kill that old bat, and why Inspector Javert couldn't just let Jean Valjean alone.

So, in a bit of a state, not only due to having been drinking beer for a change, I paid my bill and headed up to my apartment (I was at the Welly just downstairs from my apartment), and flipped open my laptop to search what we the most downloaded Ebooks, regardless of whether paid or free and discovered that the top two on Amazon are both "50 Shades of Grey"!  Goddammit.  Ok, it's official.  I give up on society.  I mean I guess women need to masterbate (ha! my computer thinks masterbate  isn't a word) over something, but jeeze....

2 comments:

Unknown said...

That's because it's spelled "masturbate"

Unknown said...

ebooks rule.