This is Thinking in Public, a program dedicated to intelligent conversation about

frontline theological and cultural issues with the people who are shaping them.

I'm Albert Mola, your host and president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

in Louisville, Kentucky.

I first saw the book 15 years ago when it was released.

The title immediately caught my attention,

the Gutenberg Elegies. The subtitle was The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age.

Now that was 1996. The electronic age then was it seemed just dawning with especially the advent of the

World Wide Web, with the internet, and with all kinds of new digital opportunities.

Nicholas Negro Ponte at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Media Lab was talking about the shift from atoms to bits. But little did we know

that just 15 years after the publication of this book, Amazon.com would report

that it's selling more electronic books than printed books.

It turned out that the Gutenberg Elegies was a bit more prophetic than even its author could

almost surely have understood.

Svenbergertz was born in Pontiac, Michigan into a family of Latvian immigrants.

He attended the University of Michigan and had his early introduction to books, first by reading,

and then by serving as a bookseller. He later became a writer

and editor and he now directs the Bennington writing seminars. Sinberkertz welcome to

thinking in public. Well thank you. Back in 1996, Finn Berkertz wrote a book entitled The Gutenberg Elegies.

The subtitle, The Book is The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age.

In his introduction, he said this.

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