In response to the previous post, Christopher posed the question why readers often speak so fondly of books, but rarely of TV, film, the internet, etc. I originally planned to put my reply in a comment, but the subject is so dear to my heart (and my response was so lengthy) that I felt it deserved a post of its own.
I think one of the reasons books are so engrossing is that they require mental effort on your part. With film and television the story has already been imagined for you, and you can passively take it in. Books, on the other hand, require you to imagine the characters, their actions, and their settings for yourself. The story you experience is partly the author's creation and partly your own, and the whole adventure takes place inside your own mind. I think that's why books are so captivating, and why we often set them aside feeling we've just returned from a journey. In our minds, we really have been in another time and place.
I suppose you can have a similar experience on the internet and perhaps the radio, but those words seem very fleeting to me. While I admittedly read more electronic words than printed ones these days, they rarely inspire the same affection in me that a book does. Perhaps it is because internet words are constantly being replaced by the latest news or blog post. By contrast, the books that have earned places of honor on our front shelf exude a comforting sense of permanence and the pleasant memories we've shared together.
I think Internet text could be compared to acquaintances--the countless people I encounter each day whose presence, whether dull or captivating, is almost certain to be short-lived. They appear, they make their mark on my life, then they move on. Books seem more like close friends who are in my life to stay. There is a certain feeling of permanence about a book I can hold in my hands, and there's something comforting about the knowledge that whenever I feel like taking a fun or thoughtful journey, The Secret Garden or Garlic and Sapphires or The Screwtape Letters are waiting just across the room to invite me in.
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8 comments:
I agree with you wholeheartedly on on this subject. I read and watch TV or movies for completely different reasons. TV and movies don't take a whole lot of effort and usually it is a time for me to just veg out for awhile. Reading is all consuming activity for me and, let's be honest, a luxury and indulgence at this point in my life. I have to get up before 6 AM just to fit in my own personal scripture study! But this is the nature of our callings as mothers and I understand that it will not always be this way. I remember as a student in college, if I was reading a book "for fun" nothing else go done! I had to set a rule that I wouldn't do any "pleasure" reading until I had completed my "required" reading. Unfortunately this usually meant that I didn't read anything of my choice during the entire semester. Not that reading a book entirely devoted to the anatomy of speech and hearing isn't interesting, but it's no "Frakenstein" or "The Great Gatsby!" I am sure you can relate. Now if I could just figure out how to read AND fold laundry at the same time...
P.S. I have read and reread "The Secret Garden" more times than I can count.
Yes! It is partly YOUR creation and partly the AUTHOR'S. Awesome analysis. This is one reason that I'm a fan of talking about books--for whatever the author intended, once you have read it, you can take from it whatever you choose.
I am a fan of certain TV shows too, but I never feel the same even after a really good program that I feel after a really good book.
P.S. A footnote to your post on the sticky topic of abortion: I read an article today in the paper talking about trends in the women choosing to have abortions. It is not big revelation that there have always been a disproportionate number of teenagers and minorities wanting abortions. I'm reading a bioethics book right now (yes, I'm a total geek) that was published in the mid-nineties. Their stat on abortion was 2:1 minorities to whites for abortions. The paper today said the current stat is closer to 5:1, though teenage abortions are way down. This tells me that another root cause of abortion that needs to be addressed is poverty. Education for women will help with that too. I had a college professor that I loved for four different courses, one of which was bioethics. He said that when you begin talking about abortion you have gotten to the point where "there are no good choices left." Here's to women making REAL choices--the ones that will uplift and edify them. The ones that will truly liberate them by bringing them closer to their true natures as children of God.
Hee. Hee. I finally went back to your 23 comment post. I hadn't seen the supreme court back and forth before. This is what my recent research illustrates:
Five years prior to Roe v. Wade, the pope issued an edict saying that all forms of artificial birth contol were contrary to God's will. The timing of the abortion issue was wrapped up in a lot of Catholic outrage about the church's stance on birth control. Abortion was seen by many (for good or bad) as another gradation in the birth control slippery slope. When Roe v. Wade was brought before the Supreme Court, nearly half of the population of the US lived in states which had already consented to various limits on access to abortion. (Incidentally, California's abortion bill as signed into law by Ronald Reagan.)
For all the controversy generated (actually getting worse over time), Roe v. Wade was seen by many people as a response to a public policy and opinion that was already wide-sweeping.
The case came out of Texas (as did the other big social cases of the last decade concerning prayers in public places, execution of mentally incompetent criminals and the illegality of sodomy laws), which had a law criminalizing all abortions. In 1965 the court had read "right to privacy" into the constitution's actual language about "personal liberty" to allow couples to purchase birth control. This implied "right to privacy" and the social climate about birth control paved the way for the court to declare the Texas law unconstitutional in 1973. Which also meant that any similar law, in any state, was also unconstitional--the ruling applying to the country as a whole, but not striking down any law within the parameters of the Court's decision.
The Court's opinion stated that fetal rights had to be balanced with maternal rights and made designations about viability. Viable fetuses could not be aborted, though they left the language on this very ambiguous as occruing sometime between 24 and 28 weeks. States may therefore pass laws that fall within the parameters of not absolutely forbidding at the one end of the spectrum, but regulating how long into pregnancy such a procedure can take place.
Technology changes the whole ball game, however. Babies can survive outside the womb at earlier and earlier gestational weeks than in the early 1970's. More sensitive instruments tell us more about when a fetus has brain waves (long considered a major consideration in the standard for death).
The other point in the broad language left by the court is also very tricky. Third trimester abortions were allowable is not just the LIFE of the mother was at stake, but her HEALTH. The second can be interpreted much more broadly than the first.
This is why various individuals are still continually challenging their own state's laws. Laws that are too restrictive are seen as stepping on the toes of the mother. Laws that are too liberal are seen as impeding fetal rights. Of course, if you believe that life is sacred from the moment of conception, any law is too liberal.
In conclusion, the Court's rulings are binding only in that laws similar to the ones either upheld or stricken down by the court will either stand or fall. This doesn't mean that NEW legislation cannot be passed or revised to meet the Court's recommendation. Case in point, the current ruling against DC's gun law. The majority opinion didn't say that restricting or regulating access guns was out of the question; it said that the DC law was too broad. (Even Barack Obama, a constitutional law professor, said that the Court's ruling was appropriate according the language and orginal intent of the constitution.) This doesn't mean that NO regulation is appropriate, it just means that any law worded like the DC law is unconstutional in its broadness.
The Court would not overturn Roe v. Wade (even the conservative, current chief justice in his confirmation hearings said that he would be unlikely to interupt the status quo because of the distrubance to our society) unless a district attorney somewhere is willing to find some woman who maliciously aborted a baby in the third trimester of pregnancy, contrary even to a liberal state law. The case would have to eventually make it to the Court who would have to rule that a very liberal state law was a violation of the fetus' right to life. The only laws such a ruling would strike down would be the very most liberal laws in the country pertaining to abortion. Many states have more restrictive laws.
Now I really have to go accomplish something.
Well said ... err ... written Kimberly Blue. :) Thanks for the post as well as your thought provoking words.
excellent interpretation and explanation of something we all take for granted and probably haven't examined too closely.
Caitlin, I had a "no pleasure reading during the semester" rule, too. Whenever I did pick up a leisure book you could guarantee that little homework, eating, or sleeping would occur until I finished it. :)
STM, thanks for the info. It's helpful to have Roe v Wade put in a larger context.
Hear, Hear! What a great explanation for books and their value. But I must admit that I can not bring myself to impose the "no pleasure reading" rule until required reading is done. I probably should but everything always seems to work out, just with me getting a little less sleep.
I think the value in movies (and the few TV programs I watch) is that you get to peek into the creators imagination. As was discussed with reading, you can take what you will, or imagine a character/setting/scenery as you desire with the description given. It frees up your imagination to wander free and I just love that experience. But just as we go to school to experience other people's points of view, to challenge what we think we know, and grow from said experience. Movies/TV provide an insight into how others imagine and interpret things. I find that this is also stimulating (given the right thing to view), though as was mentioned, not quite as much.
I also enjoyed your analogy of internet to acquaintances, and books to close friends. It is ever so true. Also as the comic stated from the previous post, I hope some day my children will discover my books and the wonderful world presented therein. Thanks for the great post on something so dear to me.
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