Thursday, June 16, 2011

Booking Through Thursday: Book "Enhancement"

btt button

This week's Booking Through Thursday question:

With the advent (and growing popularity) of eBooks, I’m seeing more and more articles about how much “better” they can be, because they have the option to be interactive … videos, music, glossaries … all sorts of little extra goodies to help “enhance” your reading experience, rather like listening to the Director’s commentary on a DVD of your favorite movie.

How do you feel about that possibility? Does it excite you in a cutting-edge kind of way? Or does it chill you to the bone because that’s not what reading is ABOUT?



Given that I'm not a fan of e-readers in general....this is a no-brainer. NO. Especially adding videos and music. If that's the kind of experience you're looking for, I'm thinking that what you want is a movie and not a book. Books are for reading. Books are for using your own imagination in addition to what the author has given you in the text and setting the mood and "seeing" the characters. It's what (to me) makes literature such an interesting field--because each reader brings something different to the book. If we have the author "leading us by the hand"--giving little interviews about what they meant and explaining every little detail about what they did and why, then why bother to read the thing?

3 comments:

Laurel-Rain Snow said...

Oh, I can relate to what you're saying, Bev, and my Kindle is something I use for traveling or when I'm out and about. And I like being able to download books right away. But the reading experience on the Kindle isn't as much fun as on a book...and maybe I'll change my thinking some day, or maybe not.

Thanks for visiting my blog.

CMash said...

I totally agree and, as usual, well said. Even though I own 2 EReaders, I love being surrounded by my print books. And also like you, I want the author to allow me to create my own vivid visualizations.

Unknown said...

Completely agree. What is going on with the world?

Here's mine:
http://carabosseslibrary.blogspot.com/2011/06/booking-through-thursday_16.html