A new friend, who is also a writer, recently turned me onto a website: goodreads.com. This is a great site, where you can track and rate the books you've read. You can also take quizzes, join online reading groups, and so forth.
At one time, I had tracked the books I was reading by noting the titles and some thoughts about them in a journal. And, Jen and I had a running list of books that we wanted to read, usually taken from the New York Times Book Review. But, through this website, we can list lots of books and even get suggestions.
Now, this is a helpful service but I also have some reservations about using it. First, can we trust that this site will be available long-term? That's one benefit of using a physical journal to track this information. And, I think there is another benefit to using an actual journal. The list of titles, when organized by date, shows the shifting trends in cultural trends. And, it helps me see how my interests and values have grown and matured over time. The website simply does not permit that sort of cultural trending.
I must admit, this is a consequence of the growing importance of technology. Now, we have electronic books and electronic ways to track what we've read. But, we no longer have physical books, filled with marginalia to show that we've read them. Perhaps I'm just too conservative when it comes to the written word but I wonder if these changes are truly moving us forward.
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