Reluctant as I was to move from print to byte, I decided my book review for the winter issue was the right time to delve into e-books, so I read half this group on my iPad, and also tried a few novels, other nonfiction, and classics. Would my doubts about e-books stand up?
I found real advantages to e-books. Bulk is one: I have a few dozen books on my iPad, with room for hundreds more, and I can give away both books and bookshelves and still have space for the rest of my life’s reading. With e-books, I may never again find myself bookless — a wifi spot is all it takes to reload. I now have free e-versions of favorite poets and novelists who are in the public domain, as well as all of Shakespeare, readily at hand.
There’s more. If I forget my reading glasses, large print is a click away. Can’t remember a particular person or character in an un-indexed novel or memoir when they reappear a hundred pages down the line? I just search for the name and look for their first appearance. Need a definition? Kindle and iBooks software can provide one instantly — though many older words stump both. iBooks can also let me leap into the Web to explore further data — a blessing for the curious and a curse for the distractible (I’m both). I can highlight text and write notes on “pages” without guilt for marking a book. And of course, on my iPad, I can read in the dark.
For a reader, print has only a few advantages. Books never need recharging, can stand up to more physical abuse — even getting wet and drying out again — often fit in pockets, are somewhat easier to flip through than e-books, and give a physical feel of progress through the pages.
So, why not give up printed books completely? The answer, for me, is surprising: It’s not books’ souls that make the difference; it’s their bodies. I cannot imagine an e-book attracting me because of its cover art, or its quality of paper. Anthony Powell titled one of his novels Books Do Furnish A Room, but e-books never will.
Having bodies, books have histories. Picking up a book, you can remember when and where you bought it and the places you read it. And recalling where I began a particular book — The Return of the Native on a subway platform in Brooklyn, Angela’s Ashes on a flight from Miami to Lima — somehow adds to the reading experience. There is also pleasure in simply looking at a volume that has been in your family for generations. You can also pass it on to your children or a friend.
One bookstore owner recently told a New York Times reporter that customers often say, “I read this book on my Kindle and now I want to own it.” Can you ever really feel you own an e-book? You can’t lend it to a friend, donate it to a charity sale, or sell it if you discover it’s a valuable first edition.
Finally, buying “real” books brings you into the orbit of other human bodies — and sometimes souls as well. I don’t ever want to lose the pleasure of entering a favorite or newly discovered bookstore, scanning the shelves and tables, sitting with a book and a coffee, asking staff for recommendations, giving or getting suggestions from another customer, or attending a reading or book signing.
When I first read Plato, I believed his claim that the body interfered with the mind’s quest to know truth. At the time, I wished I didn’t have to hold a book up, find a comfortable position, or locate adequate light, but could just absorb texts in some inexplicable visual or extrasensory way. Now that I can almost do so, I realize how naïve that view was. Only angels learn instantly and intuitively. We humans have bodies — and books — because they suit our nature, and always will. As Richard Wilbur said, “Love calls us to the things of this world.” Including books.