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This reminds me of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Many people believe the story to be about censorship, but Bradbury himself (in his later years) publicly clai

This reminds me of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Many people believe the story to be about censorship, but Bradbury himself (in his later years) publicly claimed it was about peoples' increasingly short attention spans. In Fahrenheit 451, people were afraid of books because the stories, thoughts, and concepts were more than mere sound-bytes and were thus unintelligible to the masses with shortened attention spans. Radio has contributed to our ‘growing lack of attention.’ .?.?. This sort of hopscotching existence makes it almost impossible for people, myself included, to sit down and get into a novel again. We have become a short story reading people, or, worse than that, a QUICK reading people. ~Bradbury Source: https://www.laweekly.com/news/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted-2149125 https://www.laweekly.com/news/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-mi... [Edit] Punctuation & typos.

tinalumfoil 8y ago
I tried reading 451 once, since it seemed up my alley. I got about a chapter in, put it down and never picked it up again. It wasn't that I didn't like the book (I don't remember if I did), but I just happened to get really busy right after that and just forgot that I ever started reading. Maybe if I had read it I would understand the importance of having an attention long enough to finish the book. Thing is if I had that attention span the lesson would be lost on me since I'm already reading the book. In other words, a book teaching the importance of reading books is teaching a pointless lesson.
- daveslash 8y ago
  Good point. I enjoyed it, but never picked up on the attention-span lesson at all; I read it thinking it was about censorship. I know now that the author's intent was to write a story about attention-span. I now take it to be a social commentary. Side-note: after reading the book, I rented the movie on DVD. The DVD had a scratch on it -- a scene faded out, the player hit the scratch and skipped ahead... it landed on a fade in scene. I didn't even notice. The movie I watched was only about 20 minutes and I thought "man, they left out a lot of stuff".
  - bllguo 8y ago
    bradbury's stance on Fahrenheit 451 is what convinced me that authorial intent is irrelevant.
Bekwnn 8y ago
Funny, that was how I read it too. The book burning didnt seem to be the emphasis as much as the way everyone was being actively distracted away from more complex thought. Books were just the vessal.

tinalumfoil 8y ago

I tried reading 451 once, since it seemed up my alley. I got about a chapter in, put it down and never picked it up again. It wasn't that I didn't like the book (I don't remember if I did), but I just happened to get really busy right after that and just forgot that I ever started reading. Maybe if I had read it I would understand the importance of having an attention long enough to finish the book. Thing is if I had that attention span the lesson would be lost on me since I'm already reading the book. In other words, a book teaching the importance of reading books is teaching a pointless lesson.

daveslash 8y ago
Good point. I enjoyed it, but never picked up on the attention-span lesson at all; I read it thinking it was about censorship. I know now that the author's intent was to write a story about attention-span. I now take it to be a social commentary. Side-note: after reading the book, I rented the movie on DVD. The DVD had a scratch on it -- a scene faded out, the player hit the scratch and skipped ahead... it landed on a fade in scene. I didn't even notice. The movie I watched was only about 20 minutes and I thought "man, they left out a lot of stuff".
- bllguo 8y ago
  bradbury's stance on Fahrenheit 451 is what convinced me that authorial intent is irrelevant.

Bekwnn 8y ago

Funny, that was how I read it too. The book burning didnt seem to be the emphasis as much as the way everyone was being actively distracted away from more complex thought. Books were just the vessal.