What Will They Think of Next?
By Jess D'Amico in Arts & Entertainment on Apr 23, 2007 6:46PM
We’re a little behind the times here at Chicagoist. While we knew the moment that Sanjaya was kicked off of "American Idol", some technological advances pass us by. Which is why we now proudly present to you, the audio book.
Our mom used to make us listen to them in the car when we drove to our grandparents’ house, all badly voiced and torn up cassettes from the library, and we vowed never again to submit ourselves to some out-of-work actor pretending to be a literary scholar, and just plain and simple read books.
So when we received an Audible gift certificate for our birthday, it just sort of sat there, another gift card we didn’t care to cash in (we have a mural of Starbucks’ cards on the kitchen wall). But the gift-giver insisted it really was worth our time and that we should try it out.
In light of Vladimir Nabokov’s birthday (yesterday, April 22), we downloaded Lolita, read by Jeremy Irons, and loaded it on our iPod. OK, so maybe Jeremy Irons’ unbelievably sexy voice had something to do with our choice, but all the same, we sat waiting to be disappointed by the lack of a tangible book to have and to hold. We weren’t. Jeremy Irons’ superb acting as Humbert Humbert and his almost-mocking voices of Dolores and Charlotte were thrilling. We listened to half of the 11 hour 32 minute audio book in one sitting, finding it freeing to be able to do chores or clean our room without having to put a book down and find our place again.
We write in our paperbacks, most of our book spines are twisted beyond use from the tiny garbled notes we’ve written in and dog-eared pages. This tends to slow down our reading process considerably. With the audio book, we didn’t have the luxury to stop and write notes. Although we desperately need to clutch a physical copy in our hands now, having finished, to mark up and reread at a snail’s pace, drinking in the dusty highways and unwashed hair of Dolly.
There wasn’t the danger of missing our El or bus stop because our nose wasn’t buried in musty pages, dying to know what’s next. Although we pride ourselves on the ability to walk down the street still reading, it does admittedly make us cross-eyed sometimes, and we appreciate actually being able to look at Chicago while still getting our literary fix.
The one downfall was by the time we’d reached the end of the book, sniffling at the bare humanity of Humbert Humbert, we’re pretty sure people thought we were crazy as we sat and cried while listening as though it were a bad '80s rock ballad.
Image via dalydose.