Click to see the full set
I got a strange package in the post today (which is always fun).
It turned out to be the package containing Robin Sloan’s new book, Annabel Scheme, which I along with several hundred others contributed towards bringing about.
I’m very excited about this, looking forward to the read!
Eoin
Could scholars and neuroscientists (and bloggers!) benefit from a new word for “reading on screens” and what might that word be, in your opinion?
A guest blog by Danny Bloom in Taiwan. [Thanks Dan and sorry for the delay in running this! Eoin]
I’m on a crusade of sorts to try to find a new word for “reading” on computer screens and Kindle and other e-reader device screens — other than “reading”, that is! — and I wonder if you’d join me in my quixotic quest.
I’m pushing forward with my little crusade, step by step, despite the many naysayers, who keep telling me:
“No, Danny, you’re wrong. There’s no need for a new for reading on screens. Reading is reading.”
Sometimes I feel this word search campaign is like pushing a heavy stone up a steep hill, only to have it roll back a few feet every time we advance a few inches. But along the way, I have met some experts in the education and technology fields who have told me this is a good question to ask, and to keep pushing on, gently, quietly. So I soldier on.
Although few people in the education and technology fields agree with me on this novel idea, but I remain determined. In fact, a few experts and forecasters around the world have told me privately that this crusade is worth it, if only to start a global discussion on the future of reading and the future of E-readers.
Reading on screens is a whole new ballgame, I feel, and I believe Western culture needs a new word for this new human activity. It is more than just “reading”. On a screen, you scroll, you link, you see photos and videos, you use a mouse or buttons on a Kindle, and then of course, you read. This is reading-plus-one.
So I feel we might need a new word for this, although I have no idea what that word will be in the end, because as many people have told me in the past year during the course of my crusade, new words happen organically and naturally, when the time is right, and when the need becomes more than apparent. So this is all just to jumpstart a good discussion, pro and con.
I read, of course, on both paper surfaces and screens every day, and I love both. I am not a Luddite. I love technology as much as you do. One is not a priori better or worse than the other, just different, and we need to study these differences more with brain scan tests and other scholarly research. A new word might help us “see” the differences better. That’s my hunch.
Some people online have suggested such words as “screening” and “screading”. Who knows which words we will adopt for this or when? I have no idea. I just like thinking about it now, and when the time is right, the new words or terms will come. One blogger told me we might even need two words for this, one for reading on computer screens, which are back-lit, and another for reading on e-readers like the Kindle, which uses E-Ink for the screens.
I am open to all suggestions for the new words, and I am very patient about this crusade, while at the same time steadfast and committed to this seemingly impossible word search. Patience is my middle name: Danny
“Patience” Bloom (1949 – 2032).
Do you, dear reader, have any suggestions on this? All ideas are welcome, and all comments are welcome, too, both pro and con. Let the discussion begin!
I think it would be fair to say that Raven Books comes close to being my favourite bookstores in Ireland:
It is our intention to provide an engaging and inclusive environment where the lives of individuals and the life of the community is enriched through learning, entertainment and imagination.
Louisa has succeeded in using Twitter and a lively blog to expand the impact of the store well beyond its fairly tiny size. Read the Raven Ramblings blog here, follow Raven books here on twitter and go into the shop and spend some money.
I asked her to submit a guest post for my blog and I think you’ll agree, she has done a fine job!
Eoin
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Storytelling @ Thurdays (Flickr user kodomut & cc)
I never learned from a man who agreed with me ~ Robert A Heinlein
Voltaire was the most famous man of the 18th century. Today the most famous “person” is Mickey Mouse ~ Chris Hedges
I could easily be persuaded that fire was discovered so that our ancestors had a focal point to gather around to share stories. Warmth and toasted mammoth flesh have their place in life, sure, but what made those long Neanderthal evenings magical was the re-telling of the hunt, dramatised for full effect in the flame-flickering light. We are by our nature a social species, one which has drawn together in tribes big and small across the globe and across the millennia to tell our tales. Common culture binds families, communities, societies, and the telling and re-telling of stories is of crucial importance to the health of the tribal unit at any fractal level. From the time we are infants we learn through stories the customs and mores of those we live with (dependence); we explore our boundaries through the imagination of others to better discover who we are (independence); and through fiction we are able to process difficult truths on personal and societal levels (interdependence).
What has changed dramatically since the discovery of fire is the way we experience storytelling – writing, printing, recording, radio, cinema, television, the internet – all have had their impact in altering how we
tell, absorb, and share stories. Generally in 21st century western culture we absorb a story on our own, or possibly in the predominantly silent company of others gathered around a large or small screen. For most, an essential part of processing that story is in talking about it afterwards with others – dissecting a book, film, TV show, still exploring our boundaries in adulthood as we did in childhood, adjusting (or not) as taboos are broken, traditions questioned, prejudices challenged.
For those who find themselves marginalised in their geographic community, the internet has provided an easy way for many to share and process stories with like minds, regardless of physical location. These online connections can be of tremendous comfort and affirmation to those who might otherwise feel isolated by their interests; however with the ease of these connections, the danger can arise of solipsistic virtual societies fragmenting the cohesion of the geographic community that we all, to a greater or lesser extent, depend on. Rather than the post-hunt discussion ’round the fire that strengthened the shared experience of the tribe, stories are now discussed online by anyone with little more than a language and an interest in common.
An added dimension of this shift to the virtual is the evolution of eReaders which has caused the boundaries of the book world to rapidly shift. As with any upheaval, there are those who unquestioningly embrace the change, the more cautious who may or may not be swayed by what may or may not be progress, and the stalwart who believe the only valid definition of a book includes paper and ink. For all three categories, the internet has provided readers with the means to share why they have taken the stance they have, fundamentally discussing the importance of stories in their lives – is it just about the tale, regardless of the form it is presented in? Is the enjoyment of reading linked to the tactile experience? Does accessibility affect the value of a story? How has the idea of ownership changed from the time the hunter stood before his tribe, seeking immortality through his story being retold by others, to gargantuan intellectual copyright legal documents, to Google pushing publishing boundaries into an unwritten future of who can read what and where and when?
Me, I’m still drawn to the fire, curled up with a secondhand paperback. If I’m lucky, it might even contain treasures from its previous reader – train tickets, shopping lists, a pressed flower, postcards, photographs, a scribbled maths formula; I’ve even found a love letter though, judging by the date, both the writer and recipient were long gone from this earth. Or was the letter never sent and put in the book for safekeeping? This is one of the many reasons why I love secondhand books because right there, before I’ve even read a word of it, I have the whispers of a story waiting to be told.
Louisa
Editor & Publisher and Kirkus Reviews to close. Frankly I find this a little strange. Even spinning them off might have been better, though survival on their own would have been pretty unlikely without serious reorganization and a fundamental rethinking of the business models.
Here
Canongate is profiled in the Wall Street Journal, that Jamie Byng has an eye for a book that can be packaged. It’d almost make ya jealous.
Here
Frankly, I don’t buy this Apple Tablet nonsense much. Apple cannot single-handedly change the industry, though they may try. In any case when Steve Jobs announces this on a stage somewhere, I’m sure I’ll want it, but until then, I shall waste no energy waiting or wanting.
Here
On the other hand, both Mike Shatzkin and Michael Hyatt have articles about new display systems for content that they claim will change the book world as we know it. I think both are right that change is coming but I have more sympathy with the Sports Illustrated demo video on Michael Hyatt’s post. After all that looks like a faster webpage with some extra features rather than something new. Webpages are the answer and so putting the web in every hand you can is the way forward for publishers and makes more sense than creating new, confusing and unnecessary formats. The trick is to make the customer pay for access to your content, not find a fancy way to display it.
Coming into Christmas, the reviews come thick and fast so I thought I would update.
Local History gets a good look in in the Irish Times!
The Derry Journal has an interesting article by Claire Allen, author of Writing Rainy Days And Tuesday.
Oddly enough, Culture Norther Ireland has a feature on three Poolbeg writers, Claire Allen, Emma Heatherington and Fionnuala McGoldrick.
The Irish Times carries a piece on a Faber book on Beckett’s poetry and writing. On Friday they featured one of my upcoming Christmas picks: Hidden Cork. Also on Friday this piece on a recent book on the Fine Gael story.
The Irish Independent also features the FG book. Merlin published Stop The Press! by John Kierans is also covered. As is rising chic lit star, Niamh Greene’s, Letters To A Love Rat.
Eoin
