A few days ago, Gordon noted that his new walk to work allows him to listen to podcasts and audio books regularly.  I suspect almost all of us have a commute that would permit us to plug our heads into an iPod for a reasonable chunk of the day, and I wonder whether the practice may have some salutary consequences that aren't entirely obvious.

Many have lamented the abandonment of the public sphere that iPoddery seems to encourage, and I share their reservations.  But since no one is going to rid us of our temptation for Apple's forbidden fruit any time soon, and there's little prospect of strangers on mass transit sitting down for a collective cup of tea in the near future, perhaps we ought to pan for a silver lining.  Like Gordon, a number of the listeners amongst us are not simply whiling away the time with tunes but are instead learning the news of the day or "reading" books.

After the proliferation of telephones reduced the need for personal correspondence, there was no doubt much bewailing of the loss of a literate culture.  But email may have in certain quarters revivified the written word.  (Those quarters are the ones in which written communication has not devolved to quick burps of emoticons and SMS contractions in text messages.)  Many people I know write much more now than they ever did before the profusion of email.

Similarly, I wonder whether audio books might not allow us to march through canons and classics that would otherwise remain unopened on our bookshelves if enjoying them meant wading through dactylic hexameter in four-minute increments scattered throughout the day.  On audible.com, Homer's unabridged Odyssey is about twelve hours long, or less than a fortnight's labor with a thirty-minute commute each way.  Perhaps this technology will allow us to avoid the French dilemma of figuring out "How to Discuss Books that One Has Not Read."

Of course, this practice will require us to broaden our notion of what it means "to read" a book.  Evidently, book groups all across the land are already getting snippy with members who choose to listen rather than to read their homework.  But even if one is a purist, that still leaves plenty of classics -- by Homer, Dickens, and the like -- which are the product of an oral tradition or clearly intended to be read aloud.

Would it be better if, as in auld Ireland, everyone still said "God save all here" upon entering a public house instead of mutely staring out from the headphoned vacancy of his or her own audio pod?  Yes, I think so.  But with that possibility ruled out, the notion that all those pod people are wandering around in edifying tutorials is a more encouraging prospect.

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