Writing Machines

As an English graduate, I have been programmed to critically access literature. It never accored to me to study the "Materiality" of the text I was studying. After reading "Writing Machines" by Anne Burdick, I realise that the materiality of a text is also important. We are at a time where there is such a huge body of work availabe on the World Wide Web, the web is changing how people read and also how people write.
The first chapter shows how it does not matter what environment one grows up in, interaction with a computer is inevitable. This interaction with something that is not physically a book changes how one views and percieves the text. With links, the readers opportunities to explore text is greatly widened. This can be done with books, but not as easily.
I found the chapter on "Material Metaphors" particularly interesting. The Reading Eye Dog completely changes how people ingest and comprehend text. Because of the physicality of the dog, the meaning of the text can be interpreted differently than if it was being read normally by a person. One could read a book a bout a dog who was transformed into a robot. That same person could then have the same book read to them by the Reading Eye Dog. I am sure the same person would interpret the same book differently because of the physicality of the Reading Eye Dog. This provides a whole new level to the same book.
We are at a period in time where physicality of text is changing. I think people should not be skeptical of this, people should not anticapate the end of the novel as we know it. We should be excited that a medium that has been around for a very long time is assimilating with human kinds technological advances.