“What are we going to do? Read books?”
I didn’t watch the Emmys—those types of incestuous, popularity contests don’t interest me in the least—but I remember someone saying this during the recap on the news. Some uneducated presenter was commenting about how good it was to have good TV to watch. I don’t want to waste my time here picking a battle with him and other zombies mesmerized by audiovisual pyrotechnics—you might hear such sentiments at the Oscars too—but I insist on praising the entertainment and educational value of reading a good book over any TV show or movie and asking even that presenter to consider that alternative.
First, TV shows and movies are formulaic and boring in general. Viewers can’t seem to realize what they’re missing…or they don’t care that the boob tube and the silver screen turns them into zombies. That’s their choice and their loss. Any avid reader can attest that books win over TV shows and movies hands down for the reasons mentioned. And those negatives apply to streaming video as well, which is the worst thing to happen to movies since they were invented (long after books, I might add).
Second, a good novel can entertain and educate a lot longer and more profoundly than any movie or TV show. Let’s consider a typical half- or full-hour show or even a two-hour movie. That half bour reduces to twenty minutes and that full hour reduces to forty. In that amount of time, a director can’t begin to tell a meaningful story, and a viewer doesn’t have the time to digest it even if the director could manage this miracle. A reader can read at his own pace, savoring the nuances of the story; putting it aside to ponder its lessons for a bit; or underline pithy prose sections as they go (even on a Kindle!).
Third, characters in TV shows and movies are often stereotypes and lack the complexity that real human beings have. What’s more, readers can interpret the characters in books, becoming them as they read, whereas with TV shows and movies, viewers are force-fed the actors portrayals of the characters (mostly dictated by a director, of course, because actors aren’t really that smart).
Fourth, there’s no Pulitzer, Nobel, or Booker prizes for a TV show or movie, and, as I said above, the judges of quality for the latter aren’t nearly as qualified and too involved in that media’s narcissism! Plays might be an exception, but dramas, like the novel, are first and foremost literature, not visual arts, and exist in a weird twilight zone between literature and visual arts at the best. In any case, no one should ever compare those prizes, even for drama, with those for commercial media, Emmys and Oscars.
Is this article only the rant of an erudite fiction writer? No, it’s more a suggestion to that idiot at the Emmys to try some quality entertainment, not fluff. In other words, he should read a good book!
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