Big Fat Books
A thing I totally fail to understand is Why Oh Why They Do Fatten Books! After all, books are not calves meant to be slaughtered when arranging celebrations in honour of any Prodigal Sons…
Still, books have been getting fatter and fatter, year in, year out. Which I find strange. Weird, to be more precise. See, in a world where decent paper books are being violently ousted by e-things and i-things, one would suppose decent publishers should be trying to make their production more attractive, not vice versa… Well they are not! Not attractive, fat books, I mean. If only because of the space corpulent books gobble up.
There`s usually only so much space (even if the “so” is vast) in any library or bookshop, or, for that matter, a supplier`s van. Transporting and stocking and shelving books thrice as big as your “usual” copies means thrice the expense and costs, let alone diminished choice, given that space available is limited. And of course prospective customers will think twice if not thrice before buying a fatty. I do. Like, say, is there space enough left in my bookcases? Do I really want to own this bulky book, or maybe I`d better borrow a copy from a library? While at that, do I really want to drag a load like that from the library, and then back again? And so on… OK, if I decide I badly want or need the book, I will buy it anyway, but matter is, books really worth buying seem to happen more and more seldom… And I`m a Readaholic! What about them that are not?
Then there are pocket editions. Used to be… Nowadays, a “pocket edition” cannot be stuffed into a pocket. Even a coat pocket, let alone jeans pocket. Too obese! Once upon a time, I owned a copy of “Nerve” by Dick Francis, a pocket edition. I used to take it, or its kin, along with me to read when traveling. Some damn day somebody borrowed the copy “for a coupla days just to read”, but it turned out to be for good. Happens only too often… A few years ago, I bought a new copy, a “pocket edition” again. Well it won`t go into any pocket bar the “pocket” of my big knapsack! What might the use or the purpose of that kind of “pocket editions” be I can but wonder…
I can understand publishers trying to make their goods more impressive. There`s also the ruse of making the gullible believe their money spent on a big chunk of a “literary product” is money well spent. Thence the bulk paper and the voluminous formats (and screeching covers as well, but that`s another story) and whatnot… But what they get is the converse effect, as often as not. Impressive weight does not make impressive reading. What makes books worth reading (and buying, unless you buy them to knock your enemies out by hitting them on their heads with weighty books) is something quite different!
Just curious… Are publishers stupidly suicidal, or do they do that on purpose? What purpose, precisely?
My Oh My…
© Dodo