Quote:
Originally Posted by kfarmer
It's helluva a lot closer to the hand of the artist than the reader is. Having just completed a stint in editting of a mass-produced printed book, I hate to inform you that the author does have say in the book itself. Sometimes limited by standardized templates, and perhaps sometimes the author doesn't care, or perhaps the particular printing house doesn't let the author meddle in things.
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It depends on the author. Most modern authors are typing their books on a computer so the reader is actually closer to their writing experience than the paper. Is a typeset paperback novel any closer to the quill pen of Jane Austen than the reader? They're both so far away that I don't see myself any closer to her either way. It's going to be the words that draw me in. Her words in her original manuscript may feel more like the brushstrokes of the Van Gogh in person, but I'm not going to have that. I'm going to have pulp, cardboard and a regular font set down by a machine. I actually do have a reproduction of one of her hand-written stories. It's one of the few books I value because you can see something of her in the physical object. I've been through more regular print copies of her novels than I can recall. I lend them out and don't get them back. I don't care. Someone else is enjoying them. Now I have them all on my reader whenever I want them.