I'm a dude. S is for Steve. (sorry for even the hint of Sue
Grafton there!)
No doubt about it, as i tried to say in my first email: the
LOA are beautifully (if boringly) produced, and its great to
have the funding and skill they provide in gathering in one
place what may not have been gathered in one place or
otherwise available before. And folks like us couldn't ask
for more than for Geoffrey O'Brien, the LOA's editor, to be
the one applying his taste and knowledge towards the
preservation of the works and genre we love.
So, while I respect and appreciate the LOA editions, and am
glad they exist, there's just something about the size, heft,
cleanliness and sheer damn respectability of those volumes
that, while okay for a collection of Henry Adams essays or
James Madison letters, just sucks some of the life out of the
books for me. They're just so . . . institutional. Kind of
like a Bound Mausoleum.
As Mr. T. wrote, "The words are the same but they do not
taste the same."
Doug, I also have to disagree heartily and respectfully with
you when you say that "to focus on anything else is really to
focus on ornamental stuff, nothing important." I can't
separate form and substance that easily. Reading is after all
a physical and tactile experience as well, and a book is a
tangible thing. So, if nothing else reading something in one
form can be very different than reading it in another form. A
book isn't just words - its an activity, a thing and an
expereience. Its paper, ink, covers, fonts, layout, the
ability to bend it backwards, stick it in your back pocket,
scribble in it . . . . I'd feel like I farted in church if I
wrote in the margins of the LOA volumes. And just wait until
ebooks become ubiquitous . .
. . Sure, there are many ways to "access" words, but all
reading experiences are not created equal.
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