I also wish I hadn’t bought “Freedom” as an ebook. Every time I open the Kindle app, I have to look at that blue bird pecking at a wall of Star Wars-era typography.
via The Christian Science Monitor:
Jonathan Franzen: E-readers are ‘damaging to society’
Jonathan Franzen, the author of ‘Freedom’ and ‘The Corrections,’ calls e-readers incompatible with ‘responsible self-government.’
By Husna Haq / January 30, 2012Speaking at the Hay Festival in Colombia, Jonathan Franzen had harsh words for e-books, saying they are 'not for serious readers.'
Jonathan Franzen doesn’t want you to read his bestsellers on e-readers. The acclaimed novelist of “Freedom” and “The Corrections” launched a tirade against e-books at a recent literary event, calling them “not for serious readers” and “damaging to society.”
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The inevitable response.
via Huffington Post:
Johannes Franzen: “Print Books Are Damaging to Society”
“Maybe nobody will care about hand-copied books 50 years from now, but I do. When I read a book that’s been painstakingly transcribed by hand, I’m handling an object that took a scribe six months to a year to copy,” Johannes Franzen told booksellers at the 1564 Frankfurt Book Fair.
“I think, for serious readers, a sense of permanence has always been part of the reading experience. Life is temporary: You might lose your brother at sea to scurvy, your first wife in childbirth, your mistress to tuberculosis, your second wife in childbirth, and so on. But a hand-copied book is forever.
Akopos 
