A Better Pencil

A Better Pencil examines the digital revolution in light of the history of writing technology. Baron looks at how we love, fear, actually use our writing machines-not just computers but typewriters, pencils, and clay tablets-how we deploy them to replicate the old ways of doing things while actively generating new modes of mass expression; how we learn to trust new technology and the new and strange sorts of texts that it produces; hwo we expand the notion of who can write
and who can't; and how we free our readers and writers while at the same time trying to regulate their activities.

(Oxford)

Bli först med att recensera och betygsätt boken A Better Pencil - du kan vinna 200 kr varje månad i tävlingen "Månadens recension".

Henry Farrell, Times Higher Education A useful counter-argument to the gloomy techno-pessimists,

David Finkelstein, The Times Literary Supplement Baron engages with readers' experiences and personal encounters with new media used as tools for self-expression and general dialogue. He follows a personalized, humerous and at times eccentric course, discussing writing tools (including a long and fascinating section on the complex history of pencil-making) and musing on processes and social experimentation.

Stephen Poole Highly enjoyable book...He writes with infectious curiosity and wit.

Times Higher Education There is much that is worthwhile in 'A Better Pencil'.

Stuart Kelly, Scotland on Sunday A gleeful and provocative read.

(Oxford)

Preface: Technologies of the Word; Introduction; 1. TeknoFear; 2. Thoreau's Pencil; 3. National Handwriting Day; 4. Writing on Clay; 5. When WordStar Was King; 6. Trusting the Text; 7. Writing on Screen; 8. Everyone's an Author; 9. A Space of One's Own; 10. The Dark Side of the Web; 11. From Pixels to Pencils; Works Cited

(Oxford)