The Istoriaphile’s Corner

Printed text is like the wheel in some ways.   It’s one of the first basic inventions, one that millions of others benefit from.   Before printed text, reading was reserved for the few who, through luck or wealth, could get their hands on the labor-intensive, hand-printed texts.  After Gutenberg, books became accessible to larger and larger pockets of people and more and more information became available because it was printed.  Knowledge wasn’t lost after a sheepskin or papyrus disintegrated.  Even the internet exists because we were able to amass and share knowledge through printed text.  Reading has allowed us to transmit knowledge for a long time  but, partly because it works so well, we didn’t really monkey around with the basic delivery system for years.  We have now. As a kid, I heard about audiobooks but only as substitute for blind people who hadn’t mastered Braille.  It was the 1990’s before I used them.   We rented them for long car trips as an alternative to recorded music and conversation.  Don’t ask me why but books about ocean disasters always seemed to accompany us on trips to the beach.  (It’s probably a mistake to listen to A Perfect Storm or Jaws when…