Future of the Book

When I first thought about how I read, I was shocked to realize that I have not read a paper book in almost a year. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good paper book. The smell of a brand new book, the feeling of turning the page and seeing the progress I’ve made after spending an hour reading. But now that I actually think about how I read, I realized that I read everything from my iPad mini since I bought it last summer.

I originally purchased my iPad mini as a tool to be used for school work since my laptop is outdated, slow and really heavy. I bought it under the impression that I would use it to take notes, read assigned texts, and have on the go access to Google drive to make changes to projects wherever I was. This was the perfect solution to my laptop problem that would not break my back or my bank. When I purchased the iPad I was still reading my leisure books in print, and the iPad was used solely for academic purposes. But I eventually found audio books that I could download on my iPad, and now I could finish a book while completing quality assurance at my job at Scholars Portal. Then I realized I can also download e-books onto my iPad and have access to multiple books at once without carrying them around with me. Looking back, I think this was the tipping point for me in terms of turning from paper print to electronic (and audio) versions.

Thinking about why I moved from one format to the other, I realized it had a lot to do with my life style. I commute for a good 90-120 minutes everyday to get to and from campus for work or lectures. Since I spend almost all day on campus, I need to prepare a meal or two and haul it around with me all day. On top of this, I have a gym bag. When you add it all up, I am practically a pack mule. So when I realized that I can have my books, notes, readings, emails, etc., all in a compact iPad mini, I slowly stopped using paper. I still have some classes for which I prefer to hand write my notes, but for the most part, everything I read is off of a screen since I purchased my iPad mini.

As for the specific format, I use the GoodNotes app for downloading readings and lecture slides, and Overdrive for downloading all of my e-books and audio books. A friend of mine introduced me to both of these apps and I am really happy with them. GoodNotes allows you to highlight, add text and shapes directly into a document, and you can also export and import documents. I also have all of my documents categorized based on course, which makes it easy to find everything I need. GoodNotes also has thumbnail views making it really easy to move through a document. GoodNotes has been a great solution to bringing a laptop to lectures.

 

As much as I love using my iPad, I still miss paper books and I can see myself shifting back to using and buying paper books once my schedule is less hectic and I am less of a pack mule. Although it is very convenient to have everything I need on a devise, I have noticed that my eyes are beginning to hurt from all of the on screen reading I do.

 

My reading habits are actually fairly clear-cut since I almost always prefer print. It is possible that this is partly because I don’t own an e-reader, so perhaps I just don’t know what I’m missing out on, but that is the current state of the way I read. Pretty much the only reason I read on a screen is because of school and the scholarly articles we’re asked to engage with in our coursework (usually downloaded in PDF format which I hoard on my desktop as seen in figure 1).

 Figure 1. PDF

My preferred method of reading is still print, and I often find myself tracking down print versions of readings even when they are available online. The reason comes from the pretty mundane fact that reading on a screen really strains my eyes. Maybe it’s time for an eye exam, but in my experience this is a pretty standard complaint of folks regardless of whether they have perfect vision or glasses.

Preferring print has less to do with disliking the format or the features of the online article. I really enjoy the ease of annotating PDF texts, I find it incredibly easy to add sticky notes, bookmarks, and highlight and search the document (provided the text is compatible), which lends itself to a proactive style of academic reading. If I suspend my disbelief and imagine a world where reading on a screen doesn’t hurt my eyes I think I would prefer to read scholarly articles in this format anyway. This is due to the necessity of engaging with them with a more in depth manner than reading other types of material and therefore the aforementioned ease of the annotation process. Thus the environment and style of reading reflects the content, as I could never imagine taking my laptop to the park to casually read a novel.

However even when I am reading scholarly articles, I still miss the  tactility that goes along with reading print. I believe that the physicality of reading is a big part of how we experience and internalize the information we take in while reading. The ease of rifling through pages and getting a tangible sense of what you are dealing with, creates a sense of control and understanding of a document as an entity. I often find myself losing my place and having a tough time referring back to pages in the PDF format. That being said, it saves my desk from becoming even worse of a mess than it already is!

The other type of “reading” I do on screen is via the consumption of images through social media on my iPhone. I will occasionally happen upon an article (for example, a news article – not so different from a scholarly article in terms of content and length) I actually wish to read, in which case I’ll hop on my laptop and read it there so that the text is larger and more visible (I realize I’m starting to sound seriously elderly here). I suppose in some regards it comes down to the length of the text. I can handle reading an article on my laptop because I know it won’t be extremely long, so its feels like a feasible thing to stick out. I can’t imagine trying to read an entire book off a laptop screen without my eyes drying up completely.

I am aware that some e-reader screens offer a slightly different experience that is not supposed to strain your eyes in quite the same way. I could perhaps get used to reading in that format, but because I grew up reading books in the traditional sense, the process of reading and enjoying reading is not just a mental and emotional experience but deeply physical.

Reading is something I separate into two spheres: serious/academic and pleasure. I thought the way I read was straightforward, but this week I really took the time to examine why I stick to certain habits when it comes to reading. As a child, learning to read (which started at age three) became synonymous with school. I remember my dad sitting with me and My First Primer mouthing the words as I spelled and learned to pronounce the letters and syllables. Repetition was key to learning how to read and write, I’d have copybooks full with words written over and over.

 

When examining how I read today, I realized that I exhibit some of those same principles. For academic reading I prefer a physical copy. I like highlighting important points, asking questions, and summarizing points in the margin for ease of reference when I write my papers. Spatial recognition is key for me when reading and writing. When I read the physical copy of a book or article, even if I don’t remember a point I can recall it by remembering the layout of the page and where points are situated on it.

When I study for exams I rely on this method as well. I take all my notes electronically throughout the term, but when preparing for final exams, I write everything out on flash cards. My memory recall is tied to the actions of copying and writing things down.

If I print out my notes and read them repeatedly I tend not to recall what I just read. I believe that the way I learned to read and write has bearing on the way I process information at this stage of my life.

I do most pleasure reading electronically. While I love holding the physical book in my hands (I’m pretty particular with my books, I don’t even crack the spine when I read!) the convenience of reading on my phone, Kindle, or Nexus tablet wins out. It is a lot more convenient to have my books electronically than have multiple bulky books in my backpack or purse. I don’t need to make extensive notes and portability is the main reason for reading on a screen. I rely on public transportation, so space is also an issue. It is easier to immerse myself into the universe of the book when I’m not fighting for elbow room or standing room. Reading a physical book isn’t conducive when standing, turning the page becomes difficult and often impossible. However, what I find interesting about reading on a device is that it is an isolating experience. Previous to e-readers, I could look at what a person was reading and if it looked interesting, ask them what the book was about. People love talking about their favorite authors and their books. Now, such a task is impossible. You never know what people are reading and the act of reading has become a personalized, isolated experience like those of the monks cloistered in the monastery.

Photo: Author’s bookshelf (one). 

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I am a bibliophile through and through, and for me this still means good ol’ paper books. This past year we moved into a space about double our previous bachelor apartment, and for the first time, we are able to house all of our books on numerous shelves covering each and every wall. We have relatively the same number of books, it’s just that in the past they were piled in stacks – on chairs, on the floor, on top of shelves already two-books deep…we still have that now, although the volume we’ve been able to accommodate has greatly increased (finally, no more books in boxes in a basement somewhere!). Despite some of the impracticalities of owning this many books, I am proud of our personal library, and cherish it deeply. Being able to find and afford enough space to be surrounded by our favourite books took time and effort, and yet it was of huge significance to us – books make a space feel like home. In this case, wallpapering the walls of our house, surrounding us constantly, our shelved books do become a sort of furnishing, a part of the house itself. So, where am I going with this and how does it relate to reading? Perhaps it is my absolute love of paper books that has led me to ignore digital books and e-readers. I don’t want to get into a reductive argument here about the relative value of either medium – as has been said time and again, it’s not productive, nor is it particularly stimulating. I don’t feel a sense of bibliophilic superiority, or some kind of proud technophobia or ludditeism. I simply can’t really be bothered. Sometimes, my lack of basic awareness and understanding of e-books can actually make me feel out of touch and behind the times (see last week’s blog post). For the most part though, I just don’t think about them – they aren’t a part of my reading ecology. I believe one of the reasons for this that I have touched on before is partly to do with physicality – not simply during the act of reading, but also books as objects themselves. There is a presence that is missing in what John Maxwell calls this “website in a wrapper” (39). Something in me rebels against them. When I began considering what, if anything, I actually did consume on a screen, all that came to mind is what I ‘read’ on the screen of my phone. Again, I have ‘read’ in scare quotes here because, like Andrew Piper said, I’m unsure if I can in fact call this ‘reading’ (46). Checking emails, perusing social media, glancing through online articles…all of this is something; I’m just not sure what? I don’t associate these activities with the same quality as reading a book. They are fleeting, less important interactions, more about pure, quick consumption, forgotten almost as soon as it is taken in. I print off anything that I might need to read for my classes, and perhaps in a related fashion, I still take all my notes by hand.

To be honest, I haven’t been especially reflexive before regarding my preference for printed books. As something that works for me, I’ve sort of just gone with it. I am aware that as a soon-to-be librarian, it would be helpful for me to have a better understanding of what e-books are, how they work, and why others do like to read them – if only as basic sound professional practice. I guess if I consider it, a lot of my reading habits and preferences do come down to an issue of presence and absence. When I am at home, I can look up at my books, I can gesture to them during conversation, pull one down, lend it out, put it aside for later, or place it somewhere for special consideration (my bedside table is the space for the honoured ‘book (or five) of the moment’). Come to think of it, a large part of my reading practices seem to be informed by this spatial hierarchy of meaning, by being able to manipulate books as objects in space (on a macro level), and on a micro level, being able to manipulate pages within them. I never annotate books when I read them, the most I might do is sticky note pages I want to return to. Still, knowing how far the section I’m reading is from the start or end, what the visual markers are, all of this helps me to imprint pages in my memory, to hold onto them. The covers of books, the tone and quality of their paper, the feel of them in my hand, these things help me navigate my surroundings and feel at home while reading. I always laugh when people describe the benefits of travelling with an e-reader, as it provides you with an immense array of reading options, and takes up so little space. Both my partner and I have been known to carry upwards of three and four books with us at a time (on trips whose lengths certainly don’t warrant that much reading material). Again, for us, this is okay. We don’t mind sacrificing the space. It’s worth it. Part of this silly, uncompromising stubbornness in the face of technological options makes me realize, just maybe, why I still prefer to read how I do – because it feels good. At some basic level, reading in this way gives me pleasure, and despite attempts, reading electronically just doesn’t compare.

References:

Maxwell, John W. (2013). E-book logic: We can do better. Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada. 51 (1): 29-47.

Piper, Andrew (2012). Turning the page (roaming, zooming, streaming). In Book was there: Reading in electronic times (pp. 45-61). Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

I have owned a Kobo ereader for about two years now and it’s impacted my reading habits in unexpected ways. I got an ereader particularly so that I could take out library books without waiting so long and read them without the migraines backlit screens give me after a while. I figured I would use it mostly to read library books, in particular nonfiction, which usually weigh about a thousand pounds per book. I was wrong.

Not long after I got my Kobo, it seemed like library ebooks exploded in popularity. Suddenly the holds lists I had been hoping to avoid were digital and even longer, as there are generally less digital than physical copies in the system. It became easier to get physical library books than ebooks, especially if they were in paperback. I still read the same amount of physical library books as I did before.

Certain types of writing influence me. I find it difficult to read authoritative writing (most nonfiction) on an ereader. For some reason, I can’t concentrate on it. Recently, I got an ebook on rabies out from the library. I get periodically obsessed with infectious diseases, and, having read a bunch of zombie books, was burningly curious about this devastating, zombie-plague-like infection. I opened it several times with great excitement, read a page, and found I couldn’t remember anything I had read. I’m curious to see if the physical copy will grab me. I expect it will. However, I do read scholarly articles on screen. This is mostly to save paper, and I purposefully force myself to do school readings digitally.

I generally read comics in physical trades, but if I read issues I need to read them digitally. When Neil Gaiman started publishing his new Sandman story, Overture, I bought the physical issues as they came out in order to get the full Sandman experience. I never read them. I have the same problem that I did with the nonfiction ebook. I have the physical trade on hold at the library so I can read the series.

Mostly, I find instead of reading some genres digitally and some physically, I go through phases. Sometimes I only want to read ebooks. Sometimes I can’t focus on e-text and only read physical books. Currently I’m in a physical phase.

I don’t remember having weird reading habits like these before I got into ebooks. I suppose the amount of choice they afford let me explore all the methods of reading and subconsciously settle on my favourites. Maybe, in terms of nonfiction tomes, I’m still hung up on the perceived authoritativeness of physical text versus ebooks. As many of the ebooks I’ve read have had formatting problems and mistakes (and this includes ones I’ve bought as well as library books) this may not be a completely unfounded assumption.

In case anyone is interested, the book on rabies I will eventually read is called Rabid: a cultural history of the world’s most diabolical virus by Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy.

The Sandman: Overture is a prequel to Neil Gaiman’s excellent Sandman series.

There are several items which I read distinctly on screen and on paper formats. I tend to read for pleasure on paper, therefore books and magazines will take this format. I read websites, emails, the news and journal articles on a screen. The main factors influencing my choice of formats are Convenience, Quality of Reading, and Emotional Influence.

For ease of use and availability I tend to read emails and the news on a screen. I do not feel the need to print them as typically one read through is enough and as I have a smart phone they can be referred back to later if I have forgotten something. Finding and buying a newspaper is inconvenient so I tend to opt to check the news through the CBC app. The app is much more portable and can be checked at a moments notice while waiting in line or commuting. I also tend to read journal articles on my laptop. This is not how I prefer to read them but to print the many articles I must read each week for school is very expensive and far heavier then finding them on my laptop.

Quality of reading is very important in my choice of reading on a screen versus paper. When I read off of a screen I have the tendency to skim rather than read deeply and I am far easier to distract and I am not alone. Many articles have been published with the results that readers who read off a screen over paper will skim and their comprehension will suffer (Rosenwald, 2015).

For this reason though I read articles on my laptop I will print my study notes and papers for proof reading. This allows me to concentrate on what is available without email notices popping up or distracting websites a click away.

The most important factor that influences my format choices is emotional influence. Aside from quality of reading, emotional influence also impacts my choice to study my notes on paper versus on a screen. Flipping pages while I study provides me with a sense of accomplishment and progress that I do not feel when I scroll. This is the same feeling I have when I am struggling through a text chapter in hard cover versus digital. This of accomplishment has been explained as a sensory offload that is supported by visual progress (Flood, 2014).

Though convenience is an important factor it does not always outweigh emotional impact. As I travel a lot on weekends for a time I switched to a Kobo reader because it is smaller and much lighter for packing. However while reading the kobo on the bus I found I could not read for as long and I would be more interested in what other people are doing then the story. Another aspect of emotional influence comes from my lack of luck with technology. I have dowloaded viruses at the most inconvenient of times and had accidents with three laptops resulting in a loss of all my notes. These incidents have cause me to develop a lack of trust in technology, trusting the tangibility of a book. I think I fear buying ebooks and having my Kobo die either by breaking or the soft or hardware becoming obsolete.  Needless to say I have switched back to paper books.

Emotional influence also influences my choice to read through pleasure on paper through nostalgia. I think most people who love books appreciate the smell of a new book and the feeling of a book in your hands. That is something one just does not experience on a laptop, iPad or eBook. Most of my reading happens on vacation or before sleeping. As a masters student I spend all day looking at a screen, doing work and reading a paper book allows me to disconnect from technology. I find I fall asleep faster and sleep better when I have the opportunity to read a paper book before falling asleep. This phenomenon has been examined in several studies that have found the light emitted by the reader causes the reader to become less sleepy and may take almost 10 minutes longer to fall asleep. Furthermore eReaders can cause less REM sleep and reduce reader alertness the next day (Flood, 2014).

References

Flood, Alison. (2014). Ebooks at night won’t help you sleep tight, US study finds. The Guardian. Retrieved from: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/dec/23/ebooks-affect-sleep-alertness-harvard-study

Flood, Alison. (2014). Readers absorb less on Kindles then on paper, study finds. The Guardian. Retrieved from: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/19/readers-absorb-less-kindles-paper-study-plot-ereader-digitisation

Rosenwald, Michael. (2015). Why digital natives prefer reading in print. Yes you read that right. The Washington Post. Retrieved from: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/why-digital-natives-prefer-reading-in-print-yes-you-read-that-right/2015/02/22/8596ca86-b871-11e4-9423-f3d0a1ec335c_story.html