Are Books Getting Dumber Because We Want Them To?

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June 17, 2015

Over at Bloomberg View, Stephen L. Carter examines the Amazon of the Victorian era, a book distributor named Charles Edward Mudie, and how readers are really to blame for literary fiction’s struggle to find a readership.

Carter writes about Mudie in response to Ursula K. Le Guin’s post at Book View Cafe arguing that Amazon is killing off serious literature by feeding the masses junk-food-like bestsellers.

“She is blaming Amazon for a huge shift in consumer taste, a wave Amazon may be riding but did not create.”

Mudie rode the same wave, Carter argues, by recommending and providing only books that filled the Victorian consumer’s prudish tastes.

BSKY

Kelly Lynn Thomas

Kelly Lynn Thomas reads, writes, and sometimes sews in Pittsburgh, PA. Her creative work has appeared in Souâ€™wester, Thin Air Magazine, Heavy Feather Review, metazen, and others, and she received her MFA in Creative Writing from Chatham University. She is hopelessly obsessed with Star Wars and can always be found with a large mug of tea. She also runs the very small Wild Age Press. Read more at kellylynnthomas.com.

One response

Caleb Land

June 17, 2015

It’s ironic… Coming from small town Appalachia with no book store for miles, I never would have found literary fiction were it not for Amazon. The books I read aren’t available in rural Georgia, or even in most Atlanta bookstores… I’m thankful for Amazon, I never would have read Le Guin without Amazon, that is the irony