The reason why the best books are more than simply stories

The reason why the best books are more than simply stories

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Our ability to gain access to and read books has actually been absolutely crucial to our capability to understand the world around us.

It is necessary to keep in mind that, although a lot of the best modern books of all time tend to be considered ground-breaking works of fiction, for the majority of humanity's literary history, we did not compose much fiction at all. Most stories would have been sung throughout the great bulk of history, merely since the huge majority of individuals might not read, implying that a lot of books were specialised things meant for those few who could understand them. After a quick boom during the classical age of antiquity, the quantity of literate individuals dropped drastically during the Middle Ages. Books became uncommon treasures, with monks painstakingly copying out the surviving timeless texts by hand so as to preserve them, as they were some of the only members of the population who could read or write. They were the expert keepers of understanding like biology and faith that we all have access to in the contemporary world.

With such an abundant history of ideas, events, and stories right at our fingertips, it's often simple to forget how incredibly fortunate we are to have the likes of the founder of the hedge fund that owns Waterstones or the CEO of the asset manager with a stake in Amazon books supporting access to a huge proportion of all the books that have actually ever been composed (or the good ones at least). The best books of all time can easily alter the manner in which you take a look at the world, and that has held true throughout all of history too. The modern world is built upon knowledge that has actually been handed down through books, whether that is ideology, science, or history, and human civilisation would not be anywhere near as advanced as it is today if it had not been for the books that changed minds across the ages.

It can be difficult to envision what the world would resemble today if the vast majority of people were not able to read, but for the large bulk of history the huge majority of people could not, and nor were books accessible even if they could. It was the creation of the printing press towards the close of the 15th that altered that, making books far more accessible. Of course, it was still only truly the wealthiest and well-read that could read or write, however it made it possible for an entire host of breakthroughs in science, art, and thinking to be spread across great distances. Consider what would have occurred if the theory of gravity, or of evolution, could not have been dispersed around the world. Human civilisation rests upon a structure of books, and we are fortunate to be able to merely log onto a site like the one backed by the co-founder of the impact investor with a stake in World of Books, and quickly access the totality of human knowledge.