Books We Knew

The other day, I was reading the most recent New Yorker, which comes to us in paper format via the U.S. Mail every Thursday or Friday.  It also comes via digitalness in the email every Monday, but even though I can read it four or five days earlier if I do it that way, I wait for the paper form, which is to say the magazine form of the magazine.

I'm not entirely wedded to books and paper, though, insofar as I already have found myself the possessor of a Kindle.  (I didn't buy it; it was a hand-me-down; thus, the awkward phrasing.)  I like having books around and, although I rarely buy a book (since I believe that libraries, not my house, were made to store books), I have not found myself inclined to store books on the Kindle.  This is largely because the book prices on the Kindle are higher, usually, than used book prices on the Net.  If I'm going to buy a book, it's really unlikely that I need it right this minute and am willing to pay extra for that privilege.  There are free books on the Net, of course: almost anything that is out of copyright, which includes a lot of books.  But most of them are in a format that the Kindle can't read, and thus I can't read.

So, back to the New Yorker last Tuesday morning.  I was reading an article which was taking a look at the novels, especially, of Somerset Maugham, one of the most widely-read (in English) writers in the U.S. and U.K. in the 20th Century.  I read all his novels when I was in my teens and early twenties, so his popularity was still notable in the middle-third of the last Century, although it probably peaked mid-Century.  Now, not so much: not the plays, the novels, or the short stories.  I'm a sucker for formerly famous novelists (I own the complete works of Anthony Trollope, despite my claim that I have no books permanently in my possession), and I was tempted by the article to go back and reacquaint myself with Of Human Bondage, The Moon and a Sixpence, and The Razor's Edge.  Which means going to the library's web site and ordering up copies to be delivered unto me in a week or so.  Plenty soon enough.

About ten minutes after I had this thought, there was a knock on the door and the Fed-Ex guy delivered unto me my new I-Pad.  I plugged it in, got it connected to my wi-fi network, downloaded the I-Book app, and within 15 minutes of having the I-Pad box put in my hand, I was reading Of Human Bondage.  At no cost and with no wait.  The I-Pad is an easier reader than the Kindle and weighs nothing, relatively.  And with an awful lot of classics at my disposal, I can imagine relying on ordering them from the I-Book store rather than from the local library.

And The New Yorker is preparing an App for the I-pad so that I can read it, just as I am reading the New York Times, via the New York Times App, on the I-Pad,  If this takes off as it seems to be doing, I imagine libraries are going to be having to figure out something else to do with their shelf space.  Certainly they will remain information conductors, but overdue fines look like a thing of the past.