Page v Screen

In his anything but commonplace blog, A Commonplace Blog, D.G. Myers follows up on my stray thoughts on the future of the book. I think there are still a couple of things to bring in to the discussion, and they're related. I believe the sight of print on paper - in the case of a well printed book in a decent typeface and on decent paper - is not only pleasant to see but literally easy on the eye, in a way that no on-screen image can be. I have a strong suspicion - supported by plenty of anecdotal evidence - that working closely, intensely and for long stretches of time at a screen, however supposedly friendly to the eyes, does a good deal of damage, perhaps not only to the eyes. For myself (and for many others I know of) I can testify that my eyes 'went' at exactly the time I began on-screen working in earnest. Now, some 20 years later, when I reach the end of a week crouched over the computer screen, my eyes can barely focus, I am fighting off headaches and feeling a very specific kind of exhaustion which is quite distinguishable from other forms of tiredness. It may be that screens are doing us more harm than we know - it certainly feels that way to me at the end of a hard week... For me, to turn from screen to printed page is to rest the eyes (if only by the change), and to switch my reading to any kind of on-screen device would be out of the question. And I suspect that I speak for many toilers whose days are spent in the dim, pernicious glow of a computer screen.