Posted by Holly Ordway in Literature & Literary Apologetics | 6 Comments
Miscellany 20: Rejoicing in Books
This Miscellany is all about rejoicing in books.
Here is a splendid reminder of the importance of books in the home: a study indicating that “Regular access to books has a direct impact on pupils’ results, irrespective of parents’ own education, occupation and social class.”
One of the things I’m most grateful for, in my childhood, is that my parents always made sure I was exposed to books. Some of my earliest memories are of my dad reading aloud to me from the stories of Thornton Burgess (often from copies of the books that my mom had read as a child), and we had loads of books just lying around the house, waiting to be picked up at any moment. I remember Beatrix Potter’s wonderful stories, and Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows, and Graham Oakley’s wonderful Church Mouse picture-books (so clever and funny that I love to re-read them as an adult), and books of myths and fairy tales, and somewhere along the line (I don’t quite remember when), the Chronicles of Narnia (when they were still published in the original order, which is the proper order to read them for the first time, I might add). And we went to the library as a family perhaps once a week, an outing I always looked forward to. And when I got a little older, my mom and I would have “used-bookstore outings”, packing a picnic lunch and spending the afternoon puttering around dusty shops.
Yes, I’ve loved books as long as I can remember, and I give thanks to my mom and dad for helping to cultivate that.
From the Rabbit Room, here is a nice piece on How Stories Do Their Work on Us. Read the whole piece, but here’s an important thought: “Whatever the moral of the story, reading sharpens the skills of empathy… Readers, you might say, are habitual understanders. A story allows a reader to join in the inner lives of its characters. Readers aren’t mere spectators or audience members. A well-written book allows them to experience what it’s like to be another person. And isn’t that the very basis of empathy and kindness? Isn’t it a key component of love?”
And here is one reader’s defense of keeping a physical library of print books. I do quite a lot of reading online these days, and it’s a very good thing; I have books readily available (for free!) that otherwise I’d never find. Just the other day I got GK Chesterton’ Tremendous Trifles in electronic format, for free. Yet I would firmly agree with the author here, who notes that “The books in my library are objects with temporal and spatial dimensions—they are connected to times and places of creation, acquisition, and consumption.”
A book that a friend has given me, or one that I’ve taken with me on my travels, not to mention one that I’ve dog-eared and written in as part of a writing project, are all more than just the text. And I think this attachment to the physical book is important: it’s not mere sentimentality (and anyway, what’s wrong with that?). It’s a reminder that we live in an incarnational world. Both bodies and minds, both heavens and earth, are created and sustained by God; and all will be redeemed. It’s not just the ideas, or the minds, or the souls that matter: the physical book, the body, the created world that we live in, matters too. Let us rejoice in all of it. And let’s rejoice on the way to the library or the bookstore!
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Hear! Hear! I heartily agree. I do see a Nook or a Kindle in my future, but I will never give up reading and sometimes buying physical, paper-and-ink books. I love the look, the feel, the smell and the “presence” of them. Thank you (and Michael Paulus) for putting into words what I have thought and felt all my life. This article explains and justifies why I will never part with the copy of The Return of the King that I first read. It literally fell apart, becoming difficult to reread, so I bought another copy. But I can’t bring myself to get rid of the original!
Mary, I have some books like that too! I like using real bookmarks, too. I pick them up from different bookstores when I travel (doesn’t everyone buy books when on vacation?) and then the bookmark reminds me of the place whenever I use it.
My Nook is a concession to limited space in my house. The good news is that all of my children love to read and the many of the paper books that I’ve had to give up have gone to them.
I have to travel for my work and the Nook also shines here since I can carry thousands of books with me. Also, as you mention, the availability of obtaining free copies of texts in electronic format is attractive.
I actually like reading a book on the Nook, no more cramp in my little finger from holding open the book as I read.
Yet, there is something mystical about walking into a room with shelves full of books. The cracked leather, barely legible titles and the musky smell speak of knowledge and adventures soon to come.
The travel advantage for e-books is significant. I’ve been able to reduce the weight in my carry-on bag considerably, because of that! I especially like having books of short stories in e-format for travel. When I’m weary, I might not have the focus to stay engaged with the plot of a novel, or with an interesting nonfiction work, but shorter pieces might do the trick.
Somehow I have a hard time seeing e-books as less incarnational than paper and ink ones. Mind you, I agree with the sentiment wholeheartedly, but I suspect it’s because my experience of life is bound up with them. It hasn’t always been the case throughout history, and I wouldn’t be surprsed if it changes in the future either. It certainly isn’t the case for out 10-year old. She is visually impaired and tires quickly reading paper books, so her experience of life is bound up, instead, with the iPad. She is an avid reader, and a storyteller. E-books are her access to the world beyond herself, to the art of letters and the music of words, to the mind of God in language flesh.
God became man not for the sake of an incarnation, but to reveal the radical nature of the redemption of the real, flesh and blood world. E-books certainly are part of that redemption–even if they don’t have that delicious sweet papery smell
Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Megan! I do think that it’s important to rejoice in the physicality of things (books, for instance) but what you’ve shared about your daughter reading makes me think that e-books might be more like the experience of listening to someone read to you out loud: no physical artifact, just the experience. On the other hand, with an e-book there’s no other person physically present doing the reading, so there’s still a certain incarnational quality that’s missing — but that could be more than balanced out by the other benefits of the e-book for any given reader. Interesting to think these things through!