Will books survived

Language Level: Advanced

Standard American accent

Will Books Survive?

Recently the Publisher of the New York Times, Arthur Sulzburger, Said -  in na interview with the Israeli newspaper Haaretz – that “ I don’t know  whether we’ll still be printing the Times in five years, and you know what? I don’t care either.” This statement led to speculation that most newspapers will soon be available in on-line editions only. If printed newspaper face extinction, then what about printed books?

HARD TIMES

Nancy Ann Bass works at Strands used bookstore, a veritable New York institution which was opened by her grandfather 80 years ago. She thinks that printed books do have a future, even though she admits that the independent bookstore sector is under siege.

Nancy Ann Bass (Standard American accent)

Well, in America already two-thirds of independent bookstores have closed in the last 10 years, so there’s already been huge amount of stores that are not there anymore. You know, Barnes and Nobles’ and Borders are big megastore…and they’ve come in and they’ve taken over some of that market, so it’s changed radically. The store that sells the most books in America is called Wallmart! So the bookstore industry has radically changed. I think people are buying more and more books on the internet, just for the convenience, but there’s something to be said about going into a bookstore and shopping and finding things that are unexpected and a kind of the serendipity of exploring and not knowing what’s really going to be there and you really can’t do that searching for books on the internet.

FIRST EDITIONS

Nancy Ann Bass is skeptical about the idea of reading books in a electronic format:

Nancy Ann Bass

Also, you know, there’s the Sony Reader, there’s the idea too that books are now digitized and I think that is working very well for reference books, but I think for people that like to read for pleasure, the present book form is really the best way and there’s something wonderful, tactile, about having a book in your hand, and turning pages and maybe even buying things that have been used, that other people have put their own inscription on, or put things on the side. I’ve seen a Sony Reader recently and I found the technology not (to) be that good. First of all, it costs $ 350 and you can download, I think it was 80 or 100 books. When the pages turned, too, it turns black, it wasn’t great type to read it, and they don’t have any kind of illustration like you would with regular books and, of course, there’s…you know, you never find antique leather books, or first editions that are collected and signed by authors and all that kind of wonderfulness.