The Reader’s Resolution
Hi, my name is Josephine, and I’m an obsessive bookworm.
About 11 months ago, I wrote about my ridiculous (or maybe not so ridiculous) excursion to Barnes & Nobles in The Reader’s Dilemma, and the ever-so-crucial life decision of choosing between two different reading media. Print or e-book, THAT is the question.
Well, breaking news: I have a resolution. Yes, I’ve picked my winner and loser. Actually, it’s hardly news anymore since I’ve made up my mind toward the beginning of the year, but it makes for a nice blog topic.
Which one’s the winner? Suspenseful pause. PRINT. There is no doubt about it.
Earlier in the year, I read maybe about 3 or 4 books on the Kindle, and since then I haven’t used it much. (And no, I didn’t buy the Kindle version of the Bonhoeffer book). Why is that? Here’s a bit of self-analysis.
To me, reading a book is an experience. It’s like a journey I take with the author or whoever is written in the book, and each book shapes and colors a different journey than the other. I like the fact that each book smells and feels differently in my hands, and that I could finish a journey, put it away, and move on to a new one.
With the Kindle, I get bored quite easily. I would start a new book, but the object I’m handling is identical. The way I’d flip pages is the same, the way the text looks is the same, and its weight in my bag is the same. These different books feel the same, and somehow that’s a turn-off. In fact, those books I read on the Kindle left less impression on me than the print ones, even though they were good. They were less memorable, because the experience was uniform. I even get tired of how the Kindle smells.
And those percentages at the bottom drive me crazy.
I only use the Kindle to read books that I don’t really want to own (via the lending systems through public libraries), or books that I just want to read quickly and that I don’t deem as very important. Most likely, I wouldn’t go back to these books for ideas or quotes, since the highlighting feature is a pain.
But those ones that contain treasures of ideas, I just have to own the print versions. I can get to important sections quickly because I remember where quotes are by the way the book feels (is that weird?). I can flip through pages and remember the thoughts I had when I was reading certain highlighted sections. And once I become attached to a book, I can’t return it… It’s just not possible.
I love books. I can’t help it.
