‘Why Books?’
Why books? In a two-day conference of the same name, experts from Harvard and elsewhere are investigating the fate of print in a digital age. The field of battle, Thursday and today (Oct. 28-29), is the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, the home of a prestigious fellowship program and one of Harvard’s most durable crossroads for interdisciplinary discourse. After a decade of debate, the consensus is that books are not going away — and that at best electronic communication will align powerfully with the tradition of ink and paper. “Why Books?,” two years in the making, was organized by a faculty committee headed by Leah Price ’91, RI ’07, and Ann Blair ’84, BI ’99. Price is a professor of English, Harvard College Professor, and the Radcliffe Institute’s senior adviser in the humanities. Blair, also a Harvard College Professor, is the Henry Charles Lea Professor of History. Today’s (Oct. 29) conference at the Radcliffe...