Every day and throughout the year, I spend a substantial amount of my time reading about reading. From scholarly articles to academic books to chronicles of reading and reading memoirs. I am going to post a series of short observations on the books (and the occasional articles) that I have been reading particularly reflecting on the presence (or lack thereof) of romance fiction, and on how I feel my perceptions of reading aline with the authors. 

Reinier Gerritsen’s The Last Book

The Last Book by Reinier Gerritsen (photographer); introductory essay by Boris Kachka. Published in 2014.

Boris Kachka, in the introduction of The Last Book  discusses futurist Negroponte’s prediction that the printed book will disappear by 2015. Though this prediction has not been realised, ebooks have indeed impacted the way we read. On transport, we get fewer glimpses at a stranger’s individual taste. Where print books were a window to a person’s self, tablets and ereaders, Kachka says, now act as a mirror. Phototgrapher Reinier Gerritsen observed that the incidence of people reading on trains was diminishing so he wanted to document the reading that was still being undertaken on transport.

Gerritsen’s photographs of commuters with their print reading choices depict commuters whose reading choices are broad. There are classics, bestsellers, eclectic and translated titles, children’s books, fiction and nonfiction. There are more male than female authors and more male than female commuters represented in this book. Continue reading →