So Many Books: Reading and Publishing in an Age of Abundance [Kindle Edition]

Gabriel Zaid looks at the economics of the publishing industry, and also the relative merits of books over both older (oral tradition, parchment) and newer (e-books, CD-ROMs) means of storing and exchanging information. He places reader, author, and individual book within a "constellation" of books in which ideas are exchanged. And he weaves "a hairshirt for masochistic authors" by showing how few books are read, preserved, or -- frankly -- even noticed by the reading public.

But most of all, Zaid shows that books are nothing less than the cornerstone of the effort to define, preserve, and expand culture. The fact that there are so many books to read shouldn't depress us but, instead, excite us and make those of us committed to reading a bit more secure in what some no doubt consider our eccentricity. This is a title I hope to return to again and again.

Books need to address small and specific readerships,
and computer digitization and internet communication
technologies are fostering that. Thus, a renaissance of
reading is now at hand. How we think about books, Zaid
argues, needs to be reoriented from emphasis on
publishing and best-sellers to emphasis on reading and
the conversation that books can stimulate. Books, Zaid
argues following Socrates, are a means to something
greater: private and public conversation enlivening and
sustaining civilization and culture.

Books of paper, ink, and glue will endure long into the
future, helped, not hindered, by new technology to
bypass their current commodification by big corporate
entities. (For more about that, read Jason Epstein's
"The Book Business" (2001).) Already, books are
relatively cheap to produce (compared, for example, to
films). One needs only a few thousand readers to break
even. (Think, for example, of the impact of samizdat
publications of Soviet dissidents, of Thomas Paine's
"Common Sense", and of contemporary zines.) These
advantageous economics, making possible publication of
niche works, should grow as print on demand technology
drives the costs lower. (The primary way this will
happen is by reducing the expense and risk assumed by
publishers and booksellers in maintaining inventory.)

Zaid's approach identifies new concerns. First, a
book's major cost is not the purchase price but the
time and attention required to read it. Brevity and
conciseness are important, as Zaid's book itself
demonstrates. Second, matchmaking becomes even more
important: books and readers must be able to find each
other.