When my son was four he camped out with his dad to get tickets to the first-night showing of Phantom Menace. It was a huge deal. My son had been raised on Star Wars. The 'bad guys' of his young world were "Troopers," he had seen the original movies countless times, and now there was going to be a new one, with Anakin. Not only that, but he got to sleep in a tent surrounded by a whole bunch of other people who were also REALLY EXCITED. It was a party, and parties are fun.
I did not get to camp out with them because our second son was being impatient and wanted to enter the world a little too early, so I was on bed rest (but not serious bed rest--I didn't get to camp out for tickets, but I was still in the theater the next day). It was a bummer for me, but obviously there were going to be more movies, so I would just do it next time, right? No. By the time Attack of the Clones came out, everyone was buying tickets online weeks before opening night. I never got to camp out for Star Wars tickets (and neither did my second son, who might possibly like Star Wars even more than his brother).
Down the street from our house is the Barnes & Noble where I stood in line to get the last three (four?) Harry Potter books at midnight. There's a surreal sense of community, staying up half the night with a bunch of other people who are REALLY EXCITED. It was a party, and parties are fun.
There were also the midnight-release parties at Borders for the Twilight books, and I know there have been others too, that have made a big splash at bookstores when they came out. But how much longer are those parties going to happen if the book can be downloaded onto your reader at 12:00 on the night in question? By 12:01 you can start reading (and I assure you, I never had my hands on Harry Potter by 12:01). If nothing else, everyone is going to stay home for their internet connection.
I'm going to miss the parties, the sense of community, that we're all coming together because this world that a complete stranger has created has affected all of us, more complete strangers. We have been drawn in and are fellow citizens, but the only time we really get to meet the rest of the population is when a new door is presented to us and we all gather to open it together.
That's what the one hand is thinking today about e-books.
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Shell, you're amazing. I love the way you put all of that into words. I enjoy writing, and can do a competent job of from time to time, but usually weave big, grandiloquent phrases together to craft some sort of frankly over-complicated expression of my so-called thoughts. But you have an amazing ability to put down in words something that is simple, but adorn it with such poignancy that even an opinion piece on the virtues of ebooks can bring a tear to my eye.
ReplyDeleteYou're amazing. I love being humbled by you and your abilities. I totally scored on the picking a wife thing.
In addition, I completely agree with you. I read FAR more books on my iPod than I ever expected to. I'm just finishing up the Lord of the Rings, I read the entire Dresden series, and dozens of other books as well, so I know about reading on electronic devices. I do it a lot. But, by odd coincidence, last night as I was on my iPod, reading about Gandalf coming and rescuing Sam and Frodo from the cataclysmic slopes of Mount Doom, and talking to them as they wake up in Gondor, I thought about how the only really good thing about ebooks is how convenient it makes it to carry around your book (well, whole library) with you. I don't have to worry about it getting ruined by the lunch that leaks in the bag that it is sharing space with, I don't have to carry a bulky book about with me, I don't even have to worry about picking which of the books I'm reading to bring with me that day.
But, on the other hand, if I have it on my iPod, then I don't get to pick just one book to have as my companion with me that day, and I don't get to lug it around with me, holding and carrying it with me everywhere I go. I certainly don't have the joy of feeling the page edges slide under my fingers as I find my bookmark and open the book to start another session. I don't get to smell pages, paper, and glue.
But all of that is my own, insular, personal experience. As a reader, introspection tends to be my hallmark. The pleasant isolation of reading has generally been one of the great allures of reading for me. It's not a group sport, which I think is perfect and lovely.
But not until reading your post did I realize what a group, community experience it is to read a paper book. You put it perfectly, and put new and lovely thoughts in my brain.
Thank you, as always, for being as beautiful inside as out.
Love you.
(Now, all of you sicko voyeurs that just read this private post to my wife from me, you go ahead and make your own posts. Move along. Move along.)
I'm not the only who is eloquent in this marriage. Thank you for saying such lovely things about me. And as for what you just read, electronic devices have a tendency to get persnickety when they get wet, which happens when I cry, which happens when I read the end of Return of the King. Paper has better absorbency.
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