On the impermanence and intangibility of essays on the web
Yesterday I read a really wonderful personal essay on a blog “published” by a major publication. I don’t want to identify the essay, the author or the publication, because I don’t want to appear obsequious in my praise of it. There is so much sycophantic favor-currying here in the popularity contest that is the internet. That is one complaint.
My bigger complaint is that the author’s incredibly moving essay was relegated to such an impermanent piece of “real estate” – that it will appear online only, and as such, sort of disappear quickly. Sure, it will probably remain on the website for a relatively long time, and be searchable. But as I have learned with many of my own essays for even major publications - More, Time Out, The New York Daily News - sometimes companies make changes to their websites, and old, archived pieces get wiped out. And sometimes the New York Times gets into disputes with the Author’s Guild, and then freelancers’ articles get scratched from the archive. Everything I wrote for the Times from 1994 to 2002 received that treatment.
Additionally, I found myself frustrated that the essay was not in print, on a page, in my hands. There was something about the writing that made me want to be reading it on paper, away from my computer, as opposed to scrolling through it with distracting banners and ads around it. I have found this with certain other online pieces, too.
I am realizing that for me, there is a distinction - that some writing really warrants the expenditures associated with paper and ink. It makes me deeply disappointed that there are fewer and fewer publications leaving room in their pages for great personal essays, and also fewer publishers putting out books of them.
