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Originally Posted by Giggleton
I am not judging any book, all we have are the potentials of a text towards the advancement of our culture. Every text might contain this potential.
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I don't agree that every text is as equally likely to advance our culture in some significant way. But lets say we grant this. In that case, shouldn't the author have the right to make something for their efforts?
Even more important, don't we need a mechanism to determine which works grab the national psyche and thus are better or worse now significant parts of our culture?
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How can we not be dealing with the universe? A book is after all a view of the universe through the eyes and mind of the author.
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A view of something is not the same as the the something itself.
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Would Jane Austens books have been more culturally significant if they were freely distributed at the the time of their writing? Did the printing monopoly play a role in making Ms. Austens books so culturally significant? Would Ms. Austen have written her culturally significant books if she were not able to charge people for reading them?
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Would anyone have bothered to publish them if they was no way to make money off of them?
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Bill