Book: 1 Number of sheets of paper, either printed or blank, fastened together in a cover; literary composition that would fill such a set of sheets. 2 the Bible 3 main division of a large treatise or poem or the Bible. 4 Record of bets. 5 Business accounts, records, etc. 6 libretto (of an opera)OK, let's see. This is a definition I got out of a dictionary. Nowhere does it say that a book is a small plastic case with magnetic tape.
Well, ok, now a days a book can come on CD-ROM but is still printed matter. A tape? I can accept it if it is a backup of your manuscript in case your computer decides to hit the pavement harder than a falling meteor. People, a book is something you read, not something you slap into a tape player and listen to. When I say "I'll read a book", I don't think "Let me go home, turn on my stereo and put in a cassette." No, I will grab one of those bulky things, or maybe not so bulky, sit down, and read what is written.
Who came up with the idea of books on tape anyway? To me buying a tape on book and listening to it shows total contempt for the written word. Not only that, it is lazy. Has reading become such a strenuous exercise that we now opt to take the fast food path to literacy? And can we call books on tape even literature? Literacy implies reading and writing. Listening to a tape does not involve either.
Reading is a wonderful activity, it stimulates your phantasy as well as your intellect. You actually learn when you read, it is educational. And here we are amazed that any text with an average word length of more than two syllables is considered complicated.
