Luddites, ease up

RE “Reading Between Kindle’s Lines” [Dec. 9]: Imagine for a moment that we were all living in 15th-century Germany. I wonder if authors Jonathan Franzen and Cynthia Ozick would be lamenting the arrival of Gutenberg’s printing press. Remember, literature’s origins date back thousands of years prior, when storytelling was purely an oral tradition. Considering the time frame of humankind’s sojourn on this Earth, the book itself is new technology. The Kindle has yet to prove its cultural impact, but it, or similar technology, will help assure literature’s permanence. I fetishize our ability and drive to tell stories, not the instruments on which we choose to record them.

Sean Ziebarth

Fountain Valley