(Translation note: The original Spanish tittle is a word game with "deprisa" (fast) and "de Prisa" (of Prisa) - "Fast culture" and "Culture of Prisa". Prisa is a huge mass media company in Spain, holding most of the mass media and editorials in the country. Its recently deceased owner (Jesús Polanco) is our particular, real and terrible version of citizen Kane).
" The writer who triumphs during a period is a man who sympathizes with the dominant classes of such period, which interests he defends and which goals he interprets, being identified with them".
Upton Sinclair
I took this quote from the book by Manuel García Viñó "El País: la cultura como negocio" (El País: the culture as a business). It is the prelude to the third and last part of the book.
In a society where everything is mercantilized, not even culture is safe of it. I remember that a long time ago (when I was adolescent) I left hearing the top’s radio programmes because the music played there didn’t satisfied me. And I discovered that there was music beyond such programmes. Music with which I felt fully identified, and other music with which not a lot. But with a great variety of genres and with a diversity, that I was shocked. But the shock quickly became fascination. There were many artist and musicians that never appeared, nor will appear, in the top ten lists. But it was the music what made me fell full. Completely different to the mediocrity I had heard until that moment.
Today, the same is happening with the books. The last remaining cultural shelter, cornered by the trash TV and top ten radios, has become merchandise in a fight to get a best seller and appear in the top ten books list. It is a long time ago since I discovered I didn’t fell identified with such “literature”. With those books which, despite being carefully bound and having an excellent cover, were empty inside, like the politicians speeches. Most of the best sellers are ephymeral, like their content. They are books to read just once, and be forgotten in the search of the next one in the fast changeling top list. Sometimes I want simple relax and read one of these books, usually because someone borrowed it to me or I downloaded it from internet. But they are books who leave no mark on me. It is like going to the cinema to see a Hollywood film. Just to have some unbrained fun, that’s all. But every time I see less books of the kind that allow you to read several times, to take notes, quotes, books that invite you to think, and overall, books that stir you from the armchair instead of leave you dopey.
Gutemberg’s invention is under the risk of perishing as a victim of its own success, and becoming just an instrument for the transmission of the unitary (or monolithic) thought and no-thinking. We don’t need to burn the chivalry books (translation note: this is a reference to “Don Quixote”), but we should get the option to insert other kind of books sometimes. The kind of books that you will leave to your sons when their interest about the world awakes.
Fortunately, we have a new substitute for the printing press, which has provoked controversy in a similar way to the gutembergian machine during its time. We can still find alternatives in Internet. There are still cultural shelters growing through the web. I don’t know how long will this last, but we must to seize it and learn as much as we can before the enemies of diversity and plurality sink their teeth into it. And they eat it.
In a society where everything is mercantilized, not even culture is safe of it. I remember that a long time ago (when I was adolescent) I left hearing the top’s radio programmes because the music played there didn’t satisfied me. And I discovered that there was music beyond such programmes. Music with which I felt fully identified, and other music with which not a lot. But with a great variety of genres and with a diversity, that I was shocked. But the shock quickly became fascination. There were many artist and musicians that never appeared, nor will appear, in the top ten lists. But it was the music what made me fell full. Completely different to the mediocrity I had heard until that moment.
Today, the same is happening with the books. The last remaining cultural shelter, cornered by the trash TV and top ten radios, has become merchandise in a fight to get a best seller and appear in the top ten books list. It is a long time ago since I discovered I didn’t fell identified with such “literature”. With those books which, despite being carefully bound and having an excellent cover, were empty inside, like the politicians speeches. Most of the best sellers are ephymeral, like their content. They are books to read just once, and be forgotten in the search of the next one in the fast changeling top list. Sometimes I want simple relax and read one of these books, usually because someone borrowed it to me or I downloaded it from internet. But they are books who leave no mark on me. It is like going to the cinema to see a Hollywood film. Just to have some unbrained fun, that’s all. But every time I see less books of the kind that allow you to read several times, to take notes, quotes, books that invite you to think, and overall, books that stir you from the armchair instead of leave you dopey.
Gutemberg’s invention is under the risk of perishing as a victim of its own success, and becoming just an instrument for the transmission of the unitary (or monolithic) thought and no-thinking. We don’t need to burn the chivalry books (translation note: this is a reference to “Don Quixote”), but we should get the option to insert other kind of books sometimes. The kind of books that you will leave to your sons when their interest about the world awakes.
Fortunately, we have a new substitute for the printing press, which has provoked controversy in a similar way to the gutembergian machine during its time. We can still find alternatives in Internet. There are still cultural shelters growing through the web. I don’t know how long will this last, but we must to seize it and learn as much as we can before the enemies of diversity and plurality sink their teeth into it. And they eat it.
VERSIÓN EN ESPAÑOL
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