To Book or not to Book: Is That the Question?

Kindle vs "Real Book." By now it's a common, and somewhat played debate, but it crops up every now and again, testing our loyalty to...to what? The object of affection in both cases is the literary art form. What is in question is "delivery method." What are you loyal to: paper or graphite?

What I don't like about the debate regarding e-readers is this notion that based on the delivery method I choose, one thinks they can determine my character.  The Kindle/Nook user is supposedly not passionate about reading, because:

1. They don't value the sentimental part of reading
2. They don't share books
3. They don't choose a delivery method that grants them a keepsake

Based on the aforementioned, such a person is well-suited to their e-reader, b/c a "real book" in their hands is wasted: never shared and never re-read. This is "the same as burning it." But...but...


Sentimentality

sen·ti·ment [sen-tuh-muhnt]:

1. an attitude toward something; regard; opinion.
2. a mental feeling; emotion
3. refined or tender emotion; manifestation of the higher or more refined feelings

I don't need paper to be sentimental. The way I flipped out over the Hunger Games Trilogy...sentiment. No different from the shock I felt with every page of my paperback copy of Beloved. The way I cried over The Help...sentiment. Same as when I drenched the pages weeping over Summer Sisters in hardcover. I felt sentiment while reading books on my Kindle because the sentiment doesn't lie in the "delivery method" but in the storytelling.

Sharing


I was never huge on giving my stuff away. I still want to know where my Like Water for Chocolate is! I shared it...and now it's no longer mine. However, to me, sharing is more "Dude! Have you read the Hunger Games?! It's sooooo good." I have turned 6 people on to Hunger Games, and have discussed the Trilogy at length with each person. To me, that's sharing. At the end of the day, we all read it and we were all a revenue stream for the author. Some of us were E-readers, some of used "real books." I didn't share the Kindle. I shared the Hunger Games. Beyond that you can loan certain books on Kindle (though with tacky limitations). Kindle also has built-in Facebook and Twitter applications so you can share meaningful passages or crazy moments with friends. The experience on the e-reader can be shared. 


Keepsake


Kindles hold up to 3,500 books (not 200 as some might think), and I get to keep them...just not on a bookshelf.

Now onto the doozie. Calling someone a "book burner" is almost on the level of a slur, as it has political and cultural undertones that really aren't warranted for something as trivial as "Kindle vs. Paperback." The motivation for book burning is sometimes censorship, but more often than not, it is an act of hatred or contempt for the book's contents or author. Based on that hatred I wouldn't want anyone to have access to that book. It's an oppressive act. Just because my sentiment doesn't look like someone else's, or I don't share in the same manner or I don't have a cluttered bookshelf doesn't make me a villain.

The Change

All that being said, I grew up with books. I remember being 7 or 8, and checking James and the Giant Peach out of the Mt. Vernon Elementary school library;  that is the book that started my love affair with literature. My mom made me read Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre before I even hit puberty. I was that geek with a book on the bus to and from school in jr. high and high school (believe me, I was picked on). I spent my summers at the library.

Grad school and working in public accounting (65-70 hr work weeks) were the end of the love affair. I simply didn't have time to read. From the time I was 23 to 27, I probably read 11 books total (7 of which were Harry Potter).

Saving Grace

This past Christmas I received an Amazon Kindle. Next to my GPS it has been the most utilized Christmas present I've received in years. Since that time I've read 12 books, and I have 7 recently downloaded and ready for reading (4 of which are the Game of Thrones series). I'm excited!


I appreciate my Kindle. I feel like its given something back to me. Something that I feel sentimental about, and so I guess I take issue when someone tells me I don't love reading because I own a Kindle. I love reading...thus I own a Kindle.

 

How about...What if HE were here now?

So maybe you've heard the outcry about the Newsweek cover that some critics are calling "ghoulish." Click here for the CNN article.

I don't know...when I look at it, I just sort of wish that Princess Di was still here. I wish that she had the chance to meet her daughter-in-law and see her son SO happy. I look at that picture, and there is something of sadness, but (in my opinion) this cover, and the story within, is nothing more than a wish. A wish that Princess Di could have lived to celebrate her 50th birthday. It's a wish that she'd had 14 more years of doing more philanthropic good, and 14 more years of raising her children. I remember her televised funeral, "Candle in the Wind", and all that. Admittedly, I cried.

I asked my officemate, and she thought the article cover was distasteful, and was only printed to increase sales. So...I see the point that some people are making. She's dead. Let her rest in peace. We don't know what she could've been, what she would've been...so to speculate publicly with digitally altered photos may be wrong.

Thoughts on this?

Debate on the appropriateness of the cover aside, I saw the Newsweek title: If She Were Here Now, and I wondered: What if He Were Here Now. He being Jesus Christ.

And my first thought was: Luke 18:8

However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?”

If He were here now, what would he find?

Just sayin'...