Customer Reviews

So Many Books

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
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It's largely coincidental that I read this at the turn of the old and new year, but I may just make re-reading this thoughtful little book an annual event. Both elegant and wise, "So Many Books" is not simply a defense of the book as a medium. It's also, on a larger scale, a defense of reading, of those who choose (and, as the author notes, really know *how*) to read, and of the place of reading in inter-cultural and inter-generational "conversations."

Gabriel Zaid looks at the economics of the publishing industry, and also the relative merits of books over both older (oral tradition, parchment) and newer (e-books, CD-ROMs) means of storing and exchanging information. He places reader, author, and individual book within a "constellation" of books in which ideas are exchanged. And he weaves "a hairshirt for masochistic authors" by showing how few books are read, preserved, or -- frankly -- even noticed by the reading public.

But most of all, Zaid shows that books are nothing less than the cornerstone of the effort to define, preserve, and expand culture. The fact that there are so many books to read shouldn't depress us but, instead, excite us and make those of us committed to reading a bit more secure in what some no doubt consider our eccentricity. This is a title I hope to return to again and again.

Gabriel Zaid's "So Many Books" is a stimulating and
provocative book for anyone interested in book
publishing. His brief, inexpensive book can be read in
a single sitting, yet its ideas will, I suspect,
percolate for a long time afterwards.

Books need to address small and specific readerships,
and computer digitization and internet communication
technologies are fostering that. Thus, a renaissance of
reading is now at hand. How we think about books, Zaid
argues, needs to be reoriented from emphasis on
publishing and best-sellers to emphasis on reading and
the conversation that books can stimulate. Books, Zaid
argues following Socrates, are a means to something
greater: private and public conversation enlivening and
sustaining civilization and culture.

Books of paper, ink, and glue will endure long into the
future, helped, not hindered, by new technology to
bypass their current commodification by big corporate
entities. (For more about that, read Jason Epstein's
"The Book Business" (2001).) Already, books are
relatively cheap to produce (compared, for example, to
films). One needs only a few thousand readers to break
even. (Think, for example, of the impact of samizdat
publications of Soviet dissidents, of Thomas Paine's
"Common Sense", and of contemporary zines.) These
advantageous economics, making possible publication of
niche works, should grow as print on demand technology
drives the costs lower. (The primary way this will
happen is by reducing the expense and risk assumed by
publishers and booksellers in maintaining inventory.)

Zaid's approach identifies new concerns. First, a
book's major cost is not the purchase price but the
time and attention required to read it. Brevity and
conciseness are important, as Zaid's book itself
demonstrates. Second, matchmaking becomes even more
important: books and readers must be able to find each
other.

This is a short, worthwhile book. Zaid does a great job of separating romantic ideas of "immortal words" and how books and writers "ought" to be appreciated from what makes a book truly worthwhile. As a writer, I found this short book of essays relevant to my own ongoing questions about what publishing ought to do. It helped me better understand that the success of a book isn't so much about numbers of copies sold as about whether the book participates in a real conversation. Take Me With You When You Go

This beautifully written and translated book takes the reader down surprising paths, and delights on every page. A mature, serious, and erudite thinker, Zaid smoothly meshes his ideas about the purpose of books and of reading with a fresh and clear-eyed understanding of the business of producing books. This is a book you will want to share. Too bad more of his work has not been translated.

The Great Conversation began centuries ago when Socrates walked and talked with his students. He saw no need to put his efforts on a scroll. After all, the conversation was a communication of ideas. However, Plato disagreed and gave us those talks in perpetuity. Today, when we discuss great subjects, such as the contents of provocative books, we continue this Great Conversation. "So Many Books" is a marvelously thoughtful, even a challenging continuation.

The cover illustration depicts the TBR (to-be-read) list of a typical Amazonian reviewer. Yes? Zaid includes both subjects: that unread stack and Amazon and the role it plays in matching reader with book. Think. When you go into a bookshop--or even in Amazon's cyberspace--aren't you looking for the perfect book? After Zaid discusses microcosmic you and the perfect book you seek in your constellation of books, he expands and broadens his subject exponentially until macrocosmic proportions: Amazon.

According to Zaid, eight out of ten Americans think there's a book inside waiting to meet the paper (or cyberspace). He uses mind-bending figures to make one of his major points: There are far too many books for any one person ever to read--ever! When you consider ALL the books ever written or published and how very few ever find their readers--some never being read at all!--then the question is: Why write? Do you know that eight out of ten Americans think they have a book waiting to be put on paper. Yes, I just repeated myself--to emphasize Zaid's point that there are "so many books."

On a grander scale, reading books is part of that conversation. Finding the right books is the biggest problem. An author, Zaid says, sees his work "as the centre of a whole," with each author holding that belief. How then can a reader join the conversation when it seems so scattered? By accumulating "a minimum of 'flight hours' in common." His ultimate point is this: "Learning to read is the integration of units of ever-more complex meaning." I had to chuckle. That sentence reminded me of an Amazonian reviewer who recently made a declaration that he would no longer read a book unless it is worthy of being re-read. Hence, his TBR stack and actually Read-Books promote this development of "ever-more complex meaning."

There are so many gems of sentences, even whole paragraphs that make THIS book a must-read one. Since the new school year began almost six weeks ago, I go to bed exhausted and can read just a few pages before konking out. I chuckled over this sentence: "Is anything more certain to make a book completely unintelligible than reading it slowly enough?" His point is that a reader must "grasp a book all at once, in its entirety." After developing his point, he concludes: "Reading is useless: it is a vice, pure pleasure." (Caught me unawares--reading so slowly, you know--until I grasped his whole point. Ha!)

This review touches on just a bit of the riches inside "So Many Books." However, it is the constellation of reader and books that forms the foundation. Zaid discusses Amazon's services for readers, noting that books cannot stay on shelves because of the clamor of new ones to replace them. That's where the independent seller, as found on Amazon, serves the reader. Personal case in point: I frequently buy books for my school library and so, sell discarded books on Amazon. One such book--this is a true story!--was an old travel guide of Washington, D.C. Even though the book--to me--has historical value, I thought to put it for sale just to see. Yes, the man who wrote a series of travel guides for schools back in the '50's and '60's had a son who apparently is collecting his father's books. That I could be part of this son's constellation was a thrill beyond compare.

The intermediary--the bookseller of any description (and the reviewer)--makes "the difference between daunting chaos and a diversity that encourages dialogue. Culture is conversation, and the role of the intermediary is to shape that conversation and give new meaning to readers' lives simply by helping them find the books they need to read" (133).

This reviewer hopes also to be an intermediary between a future reader of "So Many Books" and the chaos of books lost "out there."

Every reader can find find much to cherish in this 144 page volume. Gabriel Zaid's essays are vivid and concise; each chapter could stand alone; but taken together his book delivers a philosophy of reading. From time to time, I read this book again, and each time I put it down refreshed and eager to pick up another volume.

Zaid traces the preoccupation with reading back through Dr. Johnson, Seneca, and the Bible ('Of making many books there is no end', Ecclesiastes, XII, 12.) Since 1950 and TV, world population has grown by 1.8 percent a year and the publication of books has grown by 2.8 percent a year. Zaid writes that a new book is published every 30 seconds, a torrent of writing that a reader can only hope to sample.

Quoting some of the treasures here is irresistible:

"Reading liberates the reader and transports him from his book to a reading of himself and all of life. It leads him to participate in conversations, and in some cases to arrange them . . . It could even be said that to publish a book is to insert it into the middle of a conversation."

"The truly cultured are capable of owning thousands of unread books without losing their composure or their desire for more." [Not if my wife has anything to do with it!]

"Just like writers, who make things out of words that are not their own, inventive publishers, booksellers, librarians, anthologizers and critics gather texts that are not theirs into meaningful and appealing assemblages.... [In a true assemblage] "noise becomes music; scattered stars acquire an outline, names and even legends, and become recognizable constellations that guide navigation."

"As publishing has become less expensive, the urge to write my own self has become the opportunity to publish my own self. Everyone now can afford to preach in the desert." [Or in the Review section of Amazon.]

"What matters is how we feel, how we see, what we do after reading; whether the street and the clouds and the existence of others mean anything to us; whether reading makes us, physically, more alive."

....

Enough! Read this little volume for yourself. You will be amply rewarded.

Robert C. Ross 2008

If a new book is published every 30 seconds, then how do we decide what is worth reading?

Contained within the 144 pages of this book is an engaging series of conversations about books, about reading, about our 'universal graphomania'. The reader is invited to think about many different issues including: the uniqueness of each reader; the constellation of books from which to choose; and the evolution of book production. This book is an open invitation to think, to engage in debate and to question. Consider: 'The uniqueness of each reader, reflected in the particular nature of his personal library (his intellectual genome), flourishes in diversity.'

If 'every private library is a reading plan', then my own private plan is chaotic. And I love it.

Highly recommended.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Lays out ideas on how to live and think in an age of too much information. Especially notable for its deft experimental interludes (e.g., "A Hairshirt for Masochistic Authors"). A thoughtful, sympathetic look at the terror of practically infinite opportunity. Catch it.

When you reach for a book you have plenty of assumptions in the back of your mind. These assuptions may concern the price (have you ever thought why you pay roughly the same for the first novel by an uknown writer and the latest Harry Potter?), potential readership (did you ever think that in case of most books you could be on first name basis with most of their readers?) importance, distribution, you name it. Well, you have your assumptions and you have Zaid to prove you completely wrong.
Isn't it time to let a specialist open your eyes?

So Many Books: Reading And Publishing In An Age Of Abundance by poetry, essayist, and business writer Gabriel Zaid is an information-packed resource concerning the difficulties of publishing books and getting noticed. Simply put, in today's age there are so many books out there because everyone has a story to tell, few have much time to read. Witty, touching, and insightful into the whys, wherefores, and coping strategies for dealing with this modern-day publishing predicament, So Many Books should be required reading for anyone who aspires to become a published author -- or to publish the work of others.