We all thought J.J. Abrams had officially done it all. He is the simultaneous director and screenwriter of intense TV and film hits such as Lost and Star Trek, and was recently chosen to take on a huge (emphasis on huge) responsibility – Star Wars: Episode VII. Anybody who has watched Lost knows how confusing and, well, crazy Abrams’ created worlds of the screen are. Yet when a new project video teaser was released for a mysteriously titled “S.” nobody suspected anything more than a TV spinoff of a previous work at best. Yet it seems fans underestimated Abrams. He decided to write a book (a physical book…does anyone remember what that is?)
This book is not just a single story you read line by line for a few hundred pages. “S.” is an artistic book, and it takes work to read primarily because it is two stories in one. It is, at its base, a reprinted version of a 1949 V.M. Straka novel called “S.”, whose storyline is shrouded in mystery, “a highly symbolic, mystical tale,” much like the work of Abrams himself. But here comes the twist: the entire book is heavily annotated by two of Abrams’ and cowriter Doug Dorst’s created characters. A man accidentally leaves behind his copy of “S”, which is soaked in the ink of side comments. A young woman finds the book and makes her own annotations in response. Their margin conversations form a story in itself of a growing relationship between two readers. There are also some physical objects contained within the book such as a map scribbled out on a napkin, postcards, and the like. This means that the e-book version, while available, loses much of the quality and purpose of the physical book.
Don’t get me wrong- I love to read, and I really appreciate books. But to be honest, I never thought of books as an art; I had to double check about three times that this article was in the right section of the New York Times. Yet after reading it, Abrams’ somewhat exaggerated form of “book art” showed me the craftsmanship all books require. A regular book is an art, in my (newly formed) opinion. Authors do not have the same advantages as film as far as visual representations of ideas. They have to painstakingly paint a picture by stringing together the perfect combination of words, such as the original writer of “S.” whose bizarre story was only a representation of deeper things (Something we’re all familiar with after reading The Nose). A book can become even more of a visual experience in cases such as Abrams’, who somehow created an unfolding story in the teeny tiny margins of a book while simultaneously unraveling the mysteries of the original novel. Though Abrams’ spin on the story is more of a physical art, it is focused on dissecting the original work in the same way one would pick apart a painting.
I’m very curious to see how “S.” does in stores, especially compared with e-book purchases. Because it comes with physical materials, I don’t think the e-book version can compare; it’s rare these days that an old-fashioned book beats out rising technology. I know that physical books are on a slow decline, but I wonder if this creation will signal a new trend of books fighting back. Maybe this new form of books (not the same specific idea, but making a story more interactive and visual) will become more common, revolutionizing the industry as more interesting and appealing to consumers while decreasing the value of the instantly downloaded e-book. On the other hand, maybe it will be a one-time flop: a too expensive, too complicated, and too-slow-to-consume form of entertainment. I personally find it to to be a fascinating idea, and I plan on investing in this book (which came out October 29th by the way). I think that, for a very visual generation that needs constant stimulation, this form of reading is exactly what the readers of today want and and need.
WORKS CITED
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/28/books/j-j-abrams-and-doug-dorst-collaborate-on-a-book-s.html?pagewanted=2&_r=2&adxnnlx=1383177705-m6uDTunwUKOIsSqnVxBItg&
