@ Concerning a 'Newyorker' article - TWILIGHT OF THE BOOK

Knowledge is not only a store of information but also a dialogue with the past. Knowledge has been accumulated through documents and will be passed down to our descendants through a variety of records. In that vein, reading is an access to the stored knowledge as well as a bridge connecting the past to the present. Writing is a way of adding the information to the knowledge and a method of sharing them. The exchange of the information and knowledge with others through the process of reading and writing creates the added value and a synergy effect.

  According to Proust, “To read is to receive a communication with another way of thinking, all the while remaining alone, that is while continuing to enjoy the intellectual power that one has in solitude and that conversation dissipates immediately.  People can learn various way of thinking from books and compare his own with others. People can promote the ability to judge which opinion is same as his own and which one is different. That fosters the process of the communication which is not only a way of accumulation of knowledge but a basic of development of democracy. In that context, I agree with Proust’s assertion in general except that “conversation dissipates the intellectual power”.  

In the individual context, reading can facilitate a better life. People enjoying reading has a high probability to get more knowledge and information as well as to get good jobs or promoted.  As Dana Gioia, the N.E.A. chairman saying, “Poor reading skills correlate heavily with lack of employment, lower wages, and fewer opportunities for advancement.”  Poor reading skills mean poor understanding and poor judgment, which could result in more mistakes while working. Can you employ or give chances to those people? People who read many kinds of books became excellent leaders or billionaires even though they did not graduate college like Lincoln, Edison, Steven Spielberg, etc, because they were able to control their mind and had creative imagination which led them to splendid achievements.

But I don’t agree to her maintenance that electronic technology fosters and encourages unification and involvement and the closeness makes it hard to negotiate differences of opinion. Did the ancient people like the old Greeks or Romans negotiate differences of opinion better than the modern people living with a variety of electronic technology does? Does TV or internet actually foster unification and involvement so that the audiences or users cannot put up with the differences of opinion? Closeness hindering from negotiate the difference of opinion doesn’t come from the electronic technology itself like TV, internet but from how the audiences sort and judge the information and knowledge acquired from TV or internet. 

      In conclusion, the importance of reading cannot be overestimated. At the same time, we must not ignore the importance of communication and conciliation, which are important ways of exchanging information and knowledge with others and can bring us a synergy effect.  //                         01-20-2011



** The Picture above is extracted from the 'NAVER dictionary'.
     It is used for an educational purpose.