I’m sure that I’ve read this before, and I expected to really enjoy a reread, so it was kind of a disappointment to, well, be so disappointed by it. The book is interesting for its interrogation of whether new technologies are less rich than old ones—an argument that has clear relevance today, as perhaps illustrated by Bradbury’s alleged reluctance to allow for an ebook version in the early 21st century. I’m not opposed to this kind of argument, but I think it’s easy for this kind of claim to get tied up in hand-wringing about civilizational decline and old/high culture being better than new/pop culture—and I feel like Bradbury ultimately has more to say about the latter than about the former.

Our family does NOT have a ’too many books’ problem. We may, however, have a ’not enough bookshelves’ problem.

Looking at the haul of new library books in our living room today, I realized that we’re both a family that buys a lot of books and a family that saves huge amounts of money thanks to the library.