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What I find amusing are those who’ve never so much as held an ereader who will loudly proclaim the superiority of paper books, as though reading anything else is somehow anti-intellectual. Or they simply don’t realize that an eink screen is not at all like a computer screen, and is really very much like reading print on paper.
Whenever they publish those interviews with authors in the NYTimes Book Review, the authors are asked if they prefer to read paper or “electronic”, and the authors invariably chose paper (of course!). I worked for years in bookstores when I was younger, and had quite a collection of paper books. I’m a bit of a book snob, actually, reading literary fiction and intellectual non-fiction mostly, but I love my Kindles! I don’t need to tell you why. I mean, having the OED with me at all times is kind of a perk! I can’t read comfortably on back-lit screens, and, anyway, a cell-phone is simply too small for reading on the bus with enlarged type so that I don’t have to drag out my glasses. I am always surprised at how few ereaders I see on Montreal public transport, actually. I don’t think that most people I see on their cell phones are actually reading – they are poking their screens much too often...
I can’t help thinking that if people could try out an ereader for a book or two, they might change their minds. Maybe venders and libraries should have loaners.
I was extolling the virtues of my old Kindle 3 to a student (a composer and a real snob!) and he jumped in quickly to state that he would never read on one of “those things”. I replied, “I know... I much prefer stone tablets, but they are hard to find today.”
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