are convenient for those of us juggling a full to-do list nine days out of the week. They also make literature more accessible…no navigating fine print, no cost of buying pages and covers, no space to hold the books, no need to carry the weight in your bag, no need to devote your attention solely to running your eyes left to write and back to left…there is what seems to be an innumerable list of reasons why audio books are wonderful.
And yet, I do wonder if we lose something? I think about the math of writing: the punctuation, the sentence structure, the syntax, the white space, the art and dance captured using characters and font across the page…isn’t that lost when all we have to go on is the sound of the words? All we hear is the meaning?
We give agency to the orator, which may not always be the writer themselves.
How do we write thinking about the sonic experience of literature separate from the visual experience of literature?
To the consumers of audio books, if you would like to experience a writer’s work in its fullest capacity, consider the text is necessary…
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