"History of the Book" by Mattie Cecil
How does the form of literature change how the reader or viewer perceives it?
[read the intro] [see other chapters in this e-book]

Below are some examples of different forms of literature. The Cuneiform tablet was carved stone; the sea scroll, hand written. The wood block print pages were individually stamped. The steam press page and letter press page, although mass produced, are still aesthetically pleasing. I chose not to show more recent forms, because we are all too familiar with paperback books, e-chapters, textbooks, etc. Handmade literature probably felt more personal and special than mass produced text, and therefore was more important to the owner. Sometimes, the form that the written word comes in is just as important as the words themselves.

At one time literature did not need flashing gifs, scrolling text, color changes every other word, or any other type of text manipulation to keep the reader interested; but as literature has changed its form, somehow the readers attention span began to shorten. We constantly need a new way to grab people’s attention. Even written communications between each other seems too time consuming, so words are abbreviated and whole thoughts are condensed down to a sentence or less so the reader will actually read it (for example, "ttyl"). Basically, literature for a lot of people has ceased to be a pleasure. At one time, having the ability to read and write was a huge privilege. Now it is a commonplace thing, and anyone can be a writer, and the work then mass-produced. Although it is great that literacy is the norm, the downside is that we must sift through less-than-great works to find the literature that we truly like.

During the middle ages, libraries began chaining all of their books to their case to avoid theft. The chain was attached to the corner of the book as opposed to the spine to avoid damage. The chains themselves were long enough so that they could be brought to a seat nearby, but could not be taken out of the building. Chained libraries were common up until the 18th century, when eventually it became unnecessary.

This demonstrates how valuable literature was to society in earlier history.

We are all accustomed to instantaneous results, and our patience has worn thin. If a web page does not show up within five seconds we become frustrated. The same can apply to literature; we want summaries, not the actual content. We want single word answers to questions. If given the option of reading a whole segment versus reading the key points, most would choose the second option. The literary form has evolved to become impersonal, with the goal of giving information to the reader in as shortened of a form as possible. The content of this e-chapter is important to me, although it might be a bit ‘wordy’. Realizing this, I highlighted what I felt to be the ‘key points’ that let readers know what the chapter was basically about. Had some viewers had this knowledge right off the bat, they most likely would have just read the highlights.

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