Editor’s Note: Herewith a moving piece by contributor Alex Sanchez. He describes a place for e-books, and a national e-book library, which I never would have thought of. Paul Biba
Editors note #2: The TeleRead plan would include access to a well-stocked ational digital library system for all ages, including the elderly and certainly not excluding the terminally ill. It’s great to see similar thoughts from Alex; also look at Isabelle Fetherston’s essay on e-books as the new large print. Meanwhile, even without such a system, countless public domain books exist for access at no charge, and without restrictions. – D.R.
Books are for more than just young learners. They can also serve as a sort of intellectual refuge to help us endure and if need be confront our eventual mortality. I am awed by the level of detail that is seen in many works of literature whether it is an ironic Kafkaesque death or something as dramatic as Randal Jarrell’s “Death of a Ball Turret Gunner.”
As an aspiring educator I have worked with children and can attest to the need for a national e-book library to bridge the resource gap between learners of all backgrounds. But while putting myself through school, I came into contact with another demographic that can benefit from the further adaptation of e-books, the terminally ill. These men and women, who could easily be any of us one day, are often times hospitalized for extended periods of time as they under go medical treatment. In the facility that I worked in, there was a real absence of substantive reading material, with the patients having to under go the torture of reading one Cussler novel after another.
If we as a society put our minds into it we can help those people facing death by providing them access to literally millions of books at any time. We already have the pieces in place to make this an attainable goal. The technology exists in the form of easy-to-use devices such as the new “Nook” and the current “Kindle,” as well as an abundant collection of material freely available online at any moment, day or night. It may seem like a topic that can easily be placed on the back burner, but it is one that inevitably defines us as a people. Do we accept that people will die and simply ignore this grim reality as best we can or do we begin to make the process as stress free as possible?
I sadly remind the Authors Guild and publishers who are blocking the use of “text to speech”—and other innovations that can be used by those who are incapable of regular reading—about the people they harm. To a man or woman floating in the ocean of tumultuous uncertainty regarding either their own death or that of a loved one an e-reader can serve as a vital form of counseling, by providing them a feeling of support from those who have come before. When I find myself angered by this obstructive, inhumane confluence of economic interests, I often think back to Joseph Welsh when he asked: “You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?
I myself am a stage 4C cancer patient and I spent six weeks of my life in daily radiation therapy. EEvery day while waiting for treatment, I sufffered through boredom reading ancient magazines that people had dropped off. It really would have been nice to have eBook readers available for use. In fact, that is where I saw and touched my first Kindle, in use by a caregiver of a fellow patient who would spend an hour or more a day in the waiting room. Recently I purchased my own Kindle just for cases such as this. The interminable waits for the perpetually late doctors don’t seem as bad with my Kindle. And my days on disability are that much less boring now that I’m out of the workforce for the first time in my life.
I agree that blocking text-to-speeech does a great disservice to those with late sttage illness. If I were too weak to hold up my Kindle, it would be great to be still challenged intellectually by a good book without troubling my caregivers to read to me for hours on end and would spare the much higher expense of purchasing audiobooks that would serve their purpose for a limited time.