The store Anthropologie has interesting displays. Recently I noticed one in which an arch was made of books glued together. There’s no way to read those books or even see the titles, because the bindings face the wall. It’s certainly proper to use books in decorating. But, when in doing so, they are rendered unreadable it says something about what’s happening to books—and bookstores, and publishing—in today’s culture.
It’s not that we don’t read. Studies show nearsightedness is skyrocketing from reading smartphones. In a very crowded airport waiting area my husband and I recently observed one paper book, several tablets and lots of smart phones being read.
E-books topped print sales in 2011 and that trend continued into 2012. No surprise there. Buying and reading books on devices is pleasant, simple and cheaper. Readers can enjoy great annotation tools, interactive content and enhanced opportunities for shared reading experiences
Seth Godin blogs and writes bestselling books on marketing and post industrial revolution trends. He says the once-perfect ecosystem of paper-bound books is dying quickly. He admits he’s nostalgic contemplating “…500 years of building not one but several industries around the creation, publication, distribution, and storage of books.” His post on the subject is titled, “An End of Books,” not the end. He writes, “as always, we’ll reinvent. We still need ideas and ideas need containers.”
There’s something comforting about the kind of container that has a real cover, and pages.
We still want to possess certain books. But, increasingly, we’re purchasing our paper books online where the selection and speed and ease of purchase leaves the freestanding bookstore in the dust. I recently drove to 3 Christian bookstores looking for Rodney Stark’s THE TRIUMPH OF CHRISTIANITY, to give as a last-minute birthday gift. I expected the stores would carry it, since it was WORLD Magazine’s book of the year. I ultimately had to buy it on Amazon.
My latest bookstore visit was to a tiny shop full of old and rare books tucked into a California beach community. Will the bookstore become just another antique store?
Seth Godin says “it won’t take all books to become ‘e’” to cause the death of the bookstore as we know it, “just enough to tip the scale.” He points out that “many of these establishments are going to go from making a little bit of money every day to losing a little bit.” That’s hard to sustain for long.
This is sad, but inevitable.
Web entrepreneur, designer and novelist Jack Cheng publishes his own books in paper arguing that, “a nice hardcover is like having a place setting, having dinnerware selected to suit the food.” He says, “Maybe what we’ll lose to digital publishing are the cheaply produced mass market printings on poor quality paper. And what we’ll gain is a new appreciation for well-designed, higher-quality hardbacks,…”
Maybe. Hopefully, there will be bookstores to buy them in.