A Defence of the Traditional Book

I happen to have just spent the past week or so on work experience with the rather lovely team of Blackstaff Press. When asked to write a piece for their online blog, I jumped at the chance to have a bit of a rant against the perils of the digital age, and thought I'd share that rant here as well.

The world of publishing made for a really interesting experience. Amid jamming the photocopier, marking up proofs and hunting for witty material to entertain the online masses, it was nice to take a moment to sit back and appreciate what was going on around me. That something is perhaps simple on the surface but, for me, is something grand in substance. Books were in the making.

Anyway, along the way I happened to find myself in a small debate. The motion was traditional books ‘v’ e-books. Embrace the digital age he’d said, it’s upon us he’d heralded...to paraphrase of course. He had a point I admit; there is no denying and there is much to be said for the convenience technological updates offer. And while I fully advocate availing of these, there is a line I just cannot cross. Online academic journals are a godsend when that deadline is fast approaching, and the reading so far complete is looking sparse. Online news is equally handy to fill the short commute from A-B, or to grab snippets fast as a headline unfolds.  But this is just about my limit.

When it comes to a good book nothing, in my humble opinion, can measure up to the real thing. For a start there is that distinct and comforting smell of the pages. To dwell on that smell alone evokes memories of infant nap times spent dosing off to The Hungry Caterpillar, of learning to read with Biff and Chip, and later, of classroom friends, of summers spent sprawled in the garden, or of favourite coffee shop haunts. All of these bound up in that same smell. Tell me what the e-reader has on that? A screen backlight does not fond memories make. Then there is the small matter of a cover. I take great pleasure in whiling away entire afternoons hunting in old bookshops and markets in search of covers that I particularly like, the vintage, the beautiful, or the downright weird. There is a victory in snagging a rare copy for a bargain price. And then there is the feel and weight of a book held in your hands, and the physical bookmark charting your progress through. I enjoy all of these things and the digital equivalent offers none of them.

Essentially, and hear me out, some things just cannot be replaced by this digital age. Libraries, the home of the book, are a case in point. There are sites and blogs dedicated to libraries. Beautiful rows of shelves lined with brightly coloured, sometimes wonderfully ornate books. Books of all shapes and sizes, of all genres, books ordered meticulously. People literally aspire to re-create these spaces – granted on a smaller scale – in their homes. What are these wonderful places to be replaced with? I can only envision some nightmarish dystopia where the iconic library with its walls covered in books, the place of hushed whispers and comfy chairs, is replaced with large vacant rooms fitted with stylistic chrome mantles, upon which single electronic e-readers rest. Picture an Apple store, but quiet, and you would be along the right lines. It doesn’t really measure up some how, does it?

Ultimately, a book holds none of the distracting capabilities that an e-reader fortified with Internet connection is prone to causing. Nor is it reliant on battery and likely to die at any moment… well if you’re me anyway. And one final consideration, let’s face it, when you accidentally drop your book you are left with a damaged spine, a few crumpled pages, a tear at worst. What you are not though, is left with a hefty fee and zero books to call your own. I believe on that note, I rest my case.

Where do you stand on the e-book, paper book debate?

You can see my post as well as a host of others here!