What authors of the past do you think would have embraced the Internet?

Greenwood, Mississippi
December 15, 2008 7:11pm CST
Having an Internet presence is a must for modern authors because of the nature of the increasingly digitized world we live in. Not all authors embrace cyberspace equally, however -- for some, the Internet is just another place to market. What authors who lived before the Internet became mainstream do you think would have really embraced new technologies and which do you think wouldn't really have gotten excited about them? I think most classic sci-fi and speculative authors would have been fascinated with the Internet if they had had a chance to see it -- for instance, I can easily imagine Jules Verne blogging about science, geography, history, and the writing process. One of the later fathers of sci-fi, Arthur C. Clarke, even made a YouTube video at age 90, shortly before his death. On the other hand, I think someone like Shakespeare might feel dissatisfied with an online world increasingly composed of two minute videos, 120 character Twitter messages, and several paragraph blog posts. I think the Bard would prefer bringing grand projects to life on the stage or quite possibly in film rather than try to appeal to those with short attention spans online...I bet he'd be a good online marketer, though, and it is true that he was quite a versatile artist so I may be selling him short.
1 response
• India
16 Dec 08
yeah i agree but then again they lived in a different tiem in which they had too much free time on their hands and not much to do except htink think and think more but the internet is a fact of life now and no one can run away with it.. liek u said abt Arthur C clark happy lotting and have a nice day