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Michael Gonzalez
Professor Lago
ENG 1500-12
1/30/14
Reading Literature in the Digital Age
In times like these, where technology is practically on our fingertips all the time, the old
methods and the old ways tend to fade away. Not too long ago, the thesaurus and the dictionary
were the most used books for looking up words and find their meaning. Not even 10 years ago,
everyone used the Atlas to find out different facts, and that thick yellow book to find out the
number of the pizzeria that is three blocks away, but now in days, theres the very famous
Google and the newest thing, an Apple product called Siri. All of these new resources affect all
of us in many different ways. Many people can say that technology is destroying us as human
beings and we are becoming lazy or less of a human, but then again others say otherwise and say
that people are using resources to become better as readers, as an audience, and as people, but
lets focus on something real quick and lets talk about the people as readers and living in this
time period which people may call it the Digital Age. Is it possible for Google and all of the
other new kinds of resources a helpful tool for reading? Or is it a bad resource for reading and
takes away from reading a text? It can be both, but it must be used wisely and it cannot be
abused.
If you asked a couple of teenagers, who are well into this era and has some sort of smart
phone and are always on the internet, How do you use Google in terms of reading literature?
What do you think they would say? Well, some may say that they would find the shortest,
simplest summary to just get the point across instead of reading a long story perhaps. Or that
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teenager may say that they would read the original text, but then would go on Google or on any
of the new resources to find an interpretation online and then they would base their
understanding of the text on the interpretation that they read on the internet. Do you see a slight
problem here? Not only teenagers, but people in general would abuse the internet, Google, or any
of the new resources. These processes that are mentioned here are just a bit too easy. There is no
active reading involved or any critical thinking involved. It is almost like they are dumbing their
brains down. This new Digital Era or also known as the Microwave Era has affected our
reading in a negative way. Many students like to use websites such as Sparknotes.com to find
outlines of each chapter of a summer reading book that probably they didnt read and were
supposed to, but didnt and easily believe what people put on there. Isnt it better to read what
the author wrote and capture the true essence of the writing from the person who originally wrote
the text instead of a deluded version of the text from someone that most likely put in their own
interpretation of the text? Dont get confused, interpretations it can be insightful to see how
others see the text, but interpretations should not be the primary source for reading and it should
not influence your own interpretation of the original text. One example of using interpretation as
a tool for better understanding literature is when I was reading the poem, Where Children Live
by Naomi Shihab Nye and this poem has this bitter-sweet kind of tone to the poem. Theres a
section to the poem where it says:
To be a child again one would need to shed details
till the heart found itself dressed in the coat with a hood.
Now the heart has taken on gloves and mufflers,
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the heart never goes outside to find something to do.(Friday Poetry, where children live by
Naomi Shihab Nye)
And when I read this, I interpreted the text as an adult having to wind down and be care-free in
order to be a child again when I saw the phrase To be a child again one would need to shed
details and thought that shedding details would just be being careless. In addition, I came to the
conclusion that the narrator is protecting himself from something when he says that he had,
found itself dressed in a coat with a hood, and it made me think of a hood being as something
that is shielding you from something, but when I searched on Google, I found another
interpretation from a blogger named Karminia and she had given insight on her interpretation of
that part of the poem and said:
This means that adults would have to leave their worries, stress, work and other
things behind so that they can live like a child, carefree. Since I am constantly
busy I do not have much time to go outside and be in the fresh air. I quit playing
with dolls a long time ago because I was getting too old for them according to
society. It was time to wear make-up and worry about my hair, clothes and
looks (karminas poetry blog)
And this was a cohesive interpretation to what the poem was talking about and that helped me
see a similar, and yet broader perspective to the poem.
In addition, using the internet or Google is not all a bad thing to use as a useful reading
tool to better understand different words within a text. As for me the internet or Google has been
my dictionary for when I dont know a word that is used in a specific text. Personally, I had an
experience where I had to read the poem, Daddy by Sylvia Plath. And this poem is not an easy
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read per say and the best thing to do in this kind of situation is to read the original text several
times and then use the new digital resources to put the pieces together. For an example, in the
poem, Daddy, there is a stanza that says:
Daddy, I have had to kill you.
You died before I had time
Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,
Ghastly statue with one gray toe
Big as a Frisco seal
Reading this stanza after a few times, it can still be a little confusing. So, in this case, it seemed
best to analyze the lines on by one and then put them into a literal sense. After reading closely, I
found out that the narrator or the speaker is the reason for his or her fathers death. And then the
line, Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, Ghastly statue with one gray toe Big as a Frisco seal
confused me and there were words in that stanza that I did not understand at all. I took the words
I didnt understand such as ghastly, which means horrifying and shocking according to google,
and I put the pieces together. After that I came to the conclusion from reading the line, Marble-
heavy, a bag full of God, that the father in this poem is being described as a big man because
of the use of the words, heavy and full. In addition, when I read the line, a bag full of
God, it made me think of God and how God is supposed to be a respected, or an intimidating
figure to peoples lives and as well as the father in this poem.
As you can see, using these resources can truly be an asset to helping us better understand the
text. Again, these new digital resources should only be used as a resource, but it shouldnt take
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away from reading the original text. The internet has many pros, but as well as many cons, but
these new resources such as Google, Siri, or any other digital resource can easily be abused. As
readers and as people, we should all better ourselves as readers and use our resources wisely and
as our secondary source.



Works Cited
":: Adventures in Daily Living :: : Friday Poetry Where Children Live by Naomi Shihab Nye." :: Adventures
in Daily Living :: : Friday Poetry Where Children Live by Naomi Shihab Nye. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 May 2014.
"Karminia's Poetry Blog." Karminia's Poetry Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Jan. 2014.
Plath, Sylvia. "Daddy." Poets.org. Academy of American Poets, n.d. Web. 30 Jan. 2014.