the brain is wider than the sky

Books are changing; but are the fundamentals of reading and writing? Seeing a reader gripped by digital Brontë made me aware that electronic books are giving literacy a new dimension. Many people like this new way of enjoying a book, and some may prefer it. Look at it this way: since the 1960s when transistor radios and – by the end of the decade – colour televisions transformed popular culture, every new technological gimmick has strengthened the appeal of the sort of media that rivals the book. Music and film, TV and video games: all have outshone books in technological glamour. Now, suddenly, here is a techie way to read a book. It’s kind of cool. I don’t believe this technology will destroy the printed object; real books will never lose their charm. But Luddites who see today’s new ways of reading as an assault are fantasising. Literacy has been under attack for decades, from all directions. Reading suffered its worst assault, perhaps, from television. My nain (my Welsh grandmother) used to read all the time – in fact she was the village librarian – but you wouldn’t find many people in that same village today with the TV off, their heads in books. It is therefore surely arguable that e-readers are not the destroyers but the saviours of the book. A generation may return to the written word because of this technology.

—Ebooks don’t spell the end of literature | Art and design | guardian.co.uk (via infoneer-pulse)

(via teachingliteracy)