Book Review -- March 23, 1999

Birkerts, Sven. The Gutenberg Elegies: The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age. Boston: Faber and Faber, 1994.

by Christy Shannon

I. Table of Contents

1. MahVuhHuhPuh

2. The Paper Chase: An Autobiographical Fragment

3. The Owl Has Flown

4. The Woman in the Garden

5. Paging the Self: Privacies of Reading

6. The Shadow Life of Reading

7. From the Window of a Train

Part II: The Electronic Millennium

8. Into the Electronic Millennium

9. Perseus Unbound

10. Close Listening

11. Hypertext: Of Mouse and Man

Part III: Critical Mass: Three Meditations

12. The Western Gulf

13. The Death of Literature

14. The Narrowing Ledge

Coda: The Foustian Pact

II. Summary and Comments 

This book traces the integrating of technology into the fields of literature and composition. It discusses several types of technology, including books on tape, word processors and computers. The author is clearly dedicated to the idea that book are superior to the new types of technology. He seems terrified of the direction in which technology is leading us. "We are already captive in our webs" (131). Birkerts also discusses the passivity of listening to books on tape as opposed to active reading (141-2) and admits that "this glimpse of the future - if it is the future - has me clinging all the more tightly to my books . . ." (164). He concludes the book with the following idea, which pretty much sums up his attitude toward technology:

The devil no longer moves about on cloven hooves, reeking of brimstone. He is an affable, efficient fellow. He claims to want to help us all along to a brighter, easier future, and his sales pitch is very smooth. I was, as the old song goes, almost persuaded. I saw what it could be like, our toil and misery replaced by a vivid, pleasant dream. Fingers tap keys, oceans of facts and sensation get downloaded, are dissolved through the nervous system. Bottomless wells of data are accessed and manipulated, everything flowing at circuit speed. Gone the rock in the field, the broken hoe, the grueling distances. "History," said Stephen Dedalus, "is a nightmare from which I am trying to awaken." This may be the awakening, but it feels curiously like the fantasies that circulate through our sleep. From deep in the heart I hear a voice that says, "Refuse it." (Birkerts 229)

The book provides interesting background information into how technology became more integrated into literature and composition courses. However, it is difficult to get past the author’s bias against technology. His persistence in clinging to the superiority of books overshadows any other message he might be trying to convey. His attitude toward technology is very much like the attitude of Thamus in the fable presented at the end of The Phaedrus. Just as Thamus feels threatened by letters, Birkerts seems to be threatened by technology. The whole idea of people becoming lazy is revisited in this book. The book is easy to understand and offers a different way of looking at technology’s role in the literature or composition course. Instead of being eager to try this new tool, Birkerts is extremely hesitant, almost hostile, toward the idea. In my opinion, the ideas presented in the book are a step backwards. Birkerts’ fears may have some basis, but he fails to acknowledge the benefits that can come with technology. The real value of the book lies in the way it explains the basis for why some instructors still do not incorporate technology into their courses.

[top]