(from bits.blogs.nytimes.com)
As e-books gain in popularity — and as many of us download new e-books on our shiny, new tablets – two authors consider whether reading through technology affects the experience of reading.
Mohsin Hamid, the author of three novels, most recently, “How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia,” extolls the convenience and portability of e-books. But he also says e-reading “opens the door to distraction” and “invites connectivity and clicking and purchasing.” The printed book, he says, “seems to offer greater serenity.”
Printed books “make possible a less intermediated, less fractured experience,” he writes, and concludes: “That is why I love them, and why I read printed books still.”
Anna Holmes, who has written for numerous publications and edited the books “Hell Hath No Fury: Women’s Letters From the End of the Affair” and “The Book of Jezebel,” based on the popular women’s website she created in 2007, also has harsh words for the e-book.
She says, “I have yet to feel as fully invested in the pixels on a Bezos-imagined screen as I do in the indelible glyphs found on good old-fashioned book paper.”
Her reasons? She says it is hard to become involved in an e-book because it is read on a device chock full of other distractions — games, shopping, movies. And she likes the look and feel of the printed book.
No comments:
Post a Comment