The Smell of Books

One of the first things I do when I buy a book, be it a new or second hand purchase, is take a long, hard smell. I stick my nose in between the pages and take several short sniffs, followed by a long, hard inhalation. It's as if I want to brand it, source it, sniff it out like a beagle.

'Are we going to like each other?', my sniff asks. 'What if we don't get along, but feel compelled, due to the extreme price tag of this piece of literature, to finish to the last page? Will our relationship be fast and furious, where the pace of reading is intense, so as to find the ending as soon as possible, or will we savour the words, linger over the chapters, and contemplate the next step in the plot?'.

This act is going to be sorely missed by myself and others if the world continues its disappointing path towards the e-book. Anything read on a screen doesn't smell. If you tried to smell your screen, you'd end up with spots dancing before your eyes, and a stunned nose that was rudely thwacked against the monitor.

Newspapers on a screen don't smell. Who doesn't like the musty scent of a black and white paper? And what about the smudged imprinted mark that it leaves on your sleeve as you rest your elbow on the broadsheet, craning your neck to read the text on the top of page 3?

Books on a screen definitely don't smell. There's nothing romantic about flipping a page by scrolling your mouse. You can't lend a friend an e-book. You can't fall asleep with your e-book on your lap; you'll probably short circuit something, run out of batteries, and accidentally delete it as you nod off and let go of the grip on your e-book reading device (note: refuse to use the word for the Amazon-promoted e-book reading device. EBRD). You can't fold down the pages to mark the passage that touches you on an e-book, and then put it in your bag to show your girlfriend. You can't savour the last page in a chapter on an e-book; you'll accidentally 'flip' the page and unwittingly keep reading, undoubtedly revealing the twist in the plot...

No. E-books don't smell. Real books do.

But society, as we know, continues to amaze with its inventions and mechanisms to constant placate our tendency towards complete consumer satisfaction. This company, it seems, has solved it all.

I weep as I sniff the musty pages of my pre-loved copy of Lunch with Mussolini. Nothing beats the real thing.