The writers on The London Review of Books’s panel “The Author in the Age of the Internet” this past Saturday might have been divided into two categories: those who know how to operate a portable electronic gadget, and those who don’t. In the “do” camp: James Wood (critic, novelist, subject of YouTube “finger drum” video) and John Lanchester (journalist, novelist, proud owner of new iPad). In the “don’t” camp: Colm Toibin (novelist, teacher, enthusiastic chronicler of gay chat-room culture), who claims such an aversion to phones, mobile or not, that he’s grateful that in the Age of the Internet, we have e-mail, which “doesn’t ring.” Also on the panel was Mary-Kay Wilmers, editor of the Review, and Nicholas Spice, publisher, who moderated. Neither was forthcoming about his or her gadget use, although there were some early, tricky moments having to do with a microphone.
Now, about this Age of the Internet. It’s an exciting but strange thing to consider, the panelists agreed. Strange because no one yet has firm answers to questions about the Internet’s effect on the future of reading and writing and publishing, although we insist on prophesying. And strange because although we are quick to attempt to label our age, it is almost impossible to do so accurately, considering we are caught up in it and have no real idea of its trajectory. (Noting that a number of London Review people were left scrambling to reach the United States in the midst of “ash cloud” madness last week, Toibin pointed out that future historians may look back and decide to call this the Age of the Volcano.) In other words, the mere title of the event was enough to throw panel and audience into an existential tizzy. It promised to be an entertaining night.
There was talk of the way advances in technology are changing how writers write. Interestingly, both Toibin (gadget-phobic) and Lanchester (pro gadget) said they still use that ancient technology of pen on paper when composing first drafts. Toibin went off on a fairly personal tangent about the Internet’s effect on solitude. On the one hand, it has meant “the end of gay solitude,” he said, enabling formerly isolated men to connect, without fear, in far-flung places. As a writer, on the other hand, Toibin has found through the Internet a welcome increase in solitude. He doesn’t have to answer an insistent phone, because he can check e-mail at leisure; he doesn’t have to go out to eat, because he can have food delivered; he doesn’t have to go out to buy books, which leaves more time for staying in to write and read, day and night. (“Electricity,” he said — now that was a fine invention.)
There was talk, too, of how technology is changing what novelists write about. Wilmers asked, Could “Tess of the d’Urbervilles” have been written had the pill existed in the late 19th century? Probably not, but then if Thomas Hardy had lived in the Age of the Internet, perhaps he would have written a classic novel about gay men using their cellphones to seek out the nearest cool drink of water in Nebraska. (Toibin recalled his joy at learning that such a technology actually exists. Now if only he could get his cellphone to work.)
And what of the future of writing and reading? Toibin said that while the changes in our reading culture are “vast in that more people are reading,” and more people are writing and publishing their own work, the changes are “not vast, in that the impulse” to write and read has always existed. There was talk of young readers’ attention spans, and their ability (or inability) to digest longer, “difficult” texts. But who is “left behind” among readers, Wood said, as the Age of the Internet becomes the Age of Who Knows What, will have less to do with technology and much more to do with class and culture — and, he implied, parenting.
If children are taught to prize reading, then what does it matter if they read on a computer or e-reader versus good old-fashioned paper? I am not too worried about my friend’s daughter, for instance, who at age 10 is already writing her own book-review Web site. And I am not too worried about my nephew, who just turned 3 years old, because my sister-in-law has insisted that on his birthday and on holidays I send not toys or clothes, but books. The kid has a bigger home library than I ever did, because he’s inherited my old books and has a crazy aunt to restock his shelves a couple of times a year. (His favorites these days: “Horton Hears a Who,” “Oh Say Can You Say Di-no-saur” and “Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed.”) Ten years from now, my nephew may be toting an iPad or a Kindle in his backpack, but I know he will be reading. (And perhaps his back will be better off in the long run, too.)
So the panel was in accord: We can’t predict how people will read. We can only hope that authors keep giving in to the impulse to write, and that readers find their way to quality writing, no matter the tool or the medium.