Week 16 Prompt

Week 16 Prompt

Both of our readings this week talk about the culture of reading and the future of the book. So I have two questions for you as readers, pulling on your own experiences and all of the readings we have done over the semester: First, how have reading and books changed since you were a child, for you specifically? Second, talk a little about what you see in the future for reading, books, or publishing - say 20 years from now. Will we read more or less, will our reading become more interactive? What will happen to traditional publishing? This is a very free-form question, feel free to wildly extrapolate or calmly state facts, as suits your mood!

I was a child of the 80’s; born in 1974 so the 80’s were my prime youth reading years!  At the time, I lived in a rural community and our township did not pay taxes into the library system so we were not able to get “free” library cards.  Even as students, we were not able to get cards.  I am not even sure the option was available then to buy one.  I LOVED reading!  I was in the accelerated reading programs all through school so we had an advantage over our peers.  We had extra books to choose from to read!  During the school year, I always had extra books I could take home.  When the book fair rolled around, every day I was there with my money buying as much as I could.

We had a book store I LOVED called the Book Worm.  I was in there weekly (or as often as I could talk my Mom into taking me) to get the latest Francine Pascal, Caroline B. Cooney, and Christopher Pike books… and don’t get me started on the great series we had!  Cheerleaders, Sweet Valley High, Flowers in the Attic, and oh so many!  I didn’t have a way to know what books were coming out so I would just go look during the weekly book trips!  I became friends with the clerk and she started keeping track for me! I remember having bunk beds and I always slept on the bottom… I had several books tucked in the slats above my head so I could read every night at bedtime!  I usually read a few books at a time; bouncing from romance to scary to silly and back again… it was a great time growing up with those books!

So, here it is 2019, and I literally have the whole world in a little bitty thing called a cell phone!  I can look for any book ever published, I can look up what is coming out next, I can have HUNDREDS of books on my phone…I literally have a whole library in my pocket!  The small book sellers are no longer around, I don’t lie in bed and read paperbacks, and I really don’t visit any book store at all.  BUT I can download nearly any book I want to late at night, from home, in the dark… and READ it immediately on my phone!  How amazing is that!

20 years from now, we will be reading more than what we do now.  The technology now is so great about what we have access to, it will only get better.  But I do come from the school that printed books are more important!  The world is a scary place… EMP hits and guess what… no more access to eBooks!  If the apocalypse happens, my first stop is raiding the library!  We won’t have movies or TV… but I will still have printed books!  Printed books have been around since ancient Egyptian times and it will always be around in the future.  My movies and TV will be playing in my head as I read books! (Staying Awake, page 5) Those are just my thoughts!