THE GUTTENBERG ELEGIES: The Fate of Reading...

THE GUTTENBERG ELEGIES: The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age by Sven Birkerts (Fawcett/Columbine: $12.50; 231 pp.). When critic Svern Birkerts discusses the decline of serious reading, he writes with conviction and warmth. But his thesis breaks down when he argues that words written on a typewriter are somehow more valid than words written on a word processor: “Nearly weightless though it is, the word printed on the page is a thing. The configuration of impulses on a screen is not--it is a manifestation, an indeterminate entity of both particle and wave, an ectoplasmic arrival and departure.” Having posited this unprovable thesis, Birkerts rails at writers who use advanced technology. He also fails to pursue this theory to its (il)logical conclusion: Are words written with a typewriter superior to words written in ink on paper? Or scratched on papyrus with a reed pen? Or pressed into a clay tablet with a stylus?