What We Talk About When We Talk About..., Leah Price
What We Talk About When We Talk About..., Leah Price
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What We Talk About When We Talk About Books
The History and Future of Reading

Author: Leah Price

Narrator: Elisabeth Rodgers

Unabridged: 5 hr 35 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Basic Books

Published: 08/20/2019

Synopsis

Reports of the death of reading are greatly exaggerated Do you worry that you've lost patience for anything longer than a tweet? If so, you're not alone. Digital-age pundits warn that as our appetite for books dwindles, so too do the virtues in which printed, bound objects once trained us: the willpower to focus on a sustained argument, the curiosity to look beyond the day's news, the willingness to be alone. The shelves of the world's great libraries, though, tell a more complicated story. Examining the wear and tear on the books that they contain, English professor Leah Price finds scant evidence that a golden age of reading ever existed. From the dawn of mass literacy to the invention of the paperback, most readers already skimmed and multitasked. Print-era doctors even forbade the very same silent absorption now recommended as a cure for electronic addictions. The evidence that books are dying proves even scarcer. In encounters with librarians, booksellers and activists who are reinventing old ways of reading, Price offers fresh hope to bibliophiles and literature lovers alike.

Winner of the Phi Beta Kappa Christian Gauss Award, 2020

Reviews

Goodreads review by Jim on March 14, 2020

This caught my eye on the new book non-fiction shelf in the library. It’s an academic book (30 pages of notes and index) written by an English professor but in a non-academic style. Short sentences, punchy writing, the use of “I,” and an avoidance of academic jargon. That being said, it comes across......more

Goodreads review by Bam cooks the books on September 16, 2019

Professor Leah Price writes about the history and future of reading in her new book. I think we can all be reassured that, in one form or another, books and reading will continue to exist. Her chapters read to me like expanded classroom lectures or perhaps TED talks and she is obviously very erudite......more

Goodreads review by Reading_ on September 11, 2021

Regarding this book I appreciate: *The short content *The well researched topics regarding the trends and reading formats and the hype/fears that have been circulating around these past few decades regarding reading and books *The reference of the most used social media platforms (bookstagram/Youtube/Ki......more

Goodreads review by Bill on September 30, 2019

This was pretty bad. Maybe if the author had organized her material in some way, any way, and stuck to a subject for more than a paragraph or two, she might have made her points more effectively and convincingly. Among these are: • The differing impressions made by the physical presence of a book and......more

Goodreads review by Onceinabluemoon on August 20, 2019

This book is perfect for readers that love to read and learn about books. Fascinating, as an avid kindle user I was shocked at what I learned! I have always been a reader since I was 5, I laughed when they worried people wouldn’t read more than 144 characters. I am the opposite, never enjoyed short......more

Quotes

"Price's book-unlike other examples of what she calls 'autobibliography'-is funny and hopeful, rather than dour and pious...What We Talk About When We Talk About Books is an enjoyable tour, full of surprising byways into historical arcana."—Jennifer Szalai, New York Times

"[Price] is not an elegist for print: her extraordinary grasp of every development in book history, from incunabula to beach reads, monasteries to bookmobiles, suggests that a love of printed matter need not be a form of nostalgia...Her radiant descriptions of the physical properties of books, the forensic traces-from smudges to candle wax-of earlier bodies holding them, immediately sent me to the Internet..."—Dan Chiasson, New Yorker

"A witty, tonic rebuttal to the latest round of doomsday prognostications about the fate of literature."—Wall Street Journal


"Price's premise, that there truly was no golden age of reading that we should be trying to get back to, is presented with humor and charm...Those still worried that technology has spoiled their attention span shouldn't be."—Booklist

"Predictions of the death of the book weren't only greatly exaggerated; as Leah Price notes in What We Talk About When We Talk About Books, they were old news. The book has survived numerous death sentences in the past, and this time, as before, it's been the occasion to reinvent old practices of reading. What the Victorians called "furniture books" continue to adorn coffee tables and the Ikea shelves widened to accommodate them. People still hold books in their laps on couches and in coaches (enjoying the "library atmosphere" of Amtrak quiet cars). Self-help books have their roots the "bibliotherapy" proposed a century ago. It is still a very bookish world that we inhabit, and I know of no guide to it more witty and engaging than Leah Price, whose insights, erudition, and apercus had me dog-earing every other page."—Geoff Nunberg, resident linguist, NPR's Fresh Air

"Eye-opening and filled with delightful nuggets of truth, What We Talk About When We Talk About Books offers no nostalgia for a more tranquil reading past but rather a hopeful glimpse into an essential reading future."—BookPage

"A deeply researched and deeply fun-to-read reassurance that there is still hope for books-and that there always has been."—Shelf Awareness

"Price combines a lighthearted romp through literary history with a serious intent: to argue that the rise of e-texts is not the radical change often claimed...Provides welcome comfort that the beloved book is in good shape, regardless of the form it ultimately takes."—Publishers Weekly

"Price is one of the most interesting and provocative writers on books of her generation...[She] doesn't so much build arguments as allow ideas to explode on the page, detonating chain reactions as she goes. What We Talk About When We Talk About Books not only does its talking in original ways but also makes us think intensely about what books are."—Literary Review

"Books are not dead. That's the good news in this set of bookish essays...Readers who enjoy books about books will find much to like here."—Kirkus

Awards

  • The Phi Beta Kappa Christian Gauss Award
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