[tubemonkey]

From the Boston Globe:

This essay is the first in a three-part series about the past, present, and future of reading. Part two will focus on readers in transition between the page and the screen. Part three will look at the future of reading. Even on the subway, amid the jostles, conversations, and stares, a well of quiet seems to surround readers of books or newspapers or tablets. It may be a defensive quiet, but a quiet all the same, and not so unlike the habitual silences of readers in libraries or those curled in chairs at home. Their absorption distances voices, engines, and birds alike - the same sounds that can feel amplified and distinct before sleep or just after waking.