Books Between Traditional And Modern
Books Between Traditional And Modern

Summary/Abstract: The contest between the traditional book and the electronic one generates conflicting opinions on both sides. Will they be able to coexist or not? One of the best analogies will remain the one written by Umberto Eco that can be found among his conversations with Jean-Claude Carriere, in which he talks about the idea the wheel invention. After it was invented, the wheel has suffered various changes during the time. People have made all that it is possible to transform it in order to improve its utility in all forms: comfort, storing, consistency, financial value etc. What I actually want to emphasize here is the fact that once invented, the wheel has become a universal good that, although it was changed in better, it has not disappeared. On the contrary, the idea is actually the one that will last during time and will not be removed from the collective mind. Exactly the same, the idea of a book, of expressing inner feelings, no matter the way it was created, will live over the years, when the electronic book will become history too and it will be replaced with another modern and better invention. When Guttenberg had the brilliant idea of inventing a press for printing the words which were till then scribbled on scrolls or bonded as codices, the book as we know it has appeared but in the same time has not wiped centuries of literary culture, both bases coexisting for a long period of time and the evolution of any of the forms has no way brought to the complete extinction of the other. Thus a large number of codices, papyri or scrolls can be found in world’s libraries. Therefore, the danger of the traditional book’s disappearance does not seem to be that real. Everything depends on the choice of each and every one of us.

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