David Baddiel on why books struggle to compete with today’s in-flight entertainment

The problem with aircraft is that they offer too many other choices besides reading. In fact, you could gauge how much you were actually into a book by how many pages you ended up reading – and therefore how many of the fabulous onboard delights you rejected – on a long-haul flight.

November 12, 2008 by Uncategorized 1

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1 Response

  1. Lee Hadden says:
    November 13, 2008 at 5:40 pm

    An Amateur and Dilettante
    Ha! What an amateur! Real bookaholics won’t let cheap distractions bother them when confined to a seat for ten hours (see “About My Library” at: http://www.librarything.com/profile/hadden)

    Besides, you can see the writer is an amateur because the reading is gauged by the amount of time reading a specific book, instead of reading anything possible within reach. The opportunity to read a new magazine, by a bookaholic, does not take away from reading books- reading is reading! This reading for accomplishment is for people who still back in grade school, and are told to read three books over the summer. I did that before the first week of summer vacation was over- and so did many of my bookaholic friends. Only fools keep count, or take pride in simple numbers.

    Real bookaholics don’t care how many books there are left to read, their only worry is that the books they have will be read through before a new stock can be acquired from the library, bookstore or Internet. If they miscount, they may have to go to bed early.

    Sessh! What a wimp. Real readers don’t find problems, they find solutions to feed their addiction. Besides, if you have too many problems reading on airplanes or cars, there are always books on tape, that you can play on the car’s system or on a private player.

    R. Lee Hadden (These are my own opinions!)

    Reply

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