Question

Is it correct, in conversation, to say that you have read a book if you have listened to it on tape or CD or mp3?  Should one specify, in a conversational parenthetical, that one didn't actually read it on paper, but actually listened to it?  Assume the intention of the conversation is a discussion of the contents of the book, not the format, but that there is also no intention to mislead.

I'm listening to Great Expectations, unabridged, on my mp3 player, while I run.  (It's great, by the way, even better than I remember it from high school.) 

Comments

[Hondo]

Now that sounds like a question a lawyer would ask!

[Al Wheeler]

If the intention is to discuss the contents of the book, I think it is safe for all parties involved to assume that you have read the book you are discussing so fluidly, so a declaration that you have indeed read the book is not necessary. Your listeners will soon deduce how brilliant you are (or banal, as the case may be) regardless.

On the other hand, since the experience of listening is so different from reading, saying "I had Great Expectations read to me recently" would be a conversation starter.

[pjm]

I'm on a list where this was discussed at tedious length recently. Opinion seems to split according to whether the speaker prefers their books on paper or on plastic, but I agree with Al: it's irrelevant if the purpose is discussion of the story (unless you've listened to an abridged version and therefore missed an important detail somewhere.)

There are situations where it does make a big difference in comprehension. "Ella Minnow Pea," for example, simply wouldn't work in an audiobook format. I suspect the same goes for other epistolary novels (the Griffin and Sabine series!)

But in most cases, whether you listened to an audiobook or read visual text is as relevant as whether you dictated a letter or hand-wrote it: Situational.

[cmc]

Great Expectations was the reason I decided at age 14 not to be a writer. It was so good that I knew that I could never hope to match it. (Of course, a number of other factors combined to convince me that I have no talent for writing, but Great Expectations was the clincher.)

[Jeff]

"The Screwtape Letters" by C.S. Lewis is one epistolary work that is MUCH better in the audio version - read by John Cleese.

[wingsandvodka]

I'm personally of the opinion that the simple act of BUYING a book is essentially as good as reading it. So actually taking the time to listen to it should get it done.

[Nolan Winthrop]

Personally, I would consider listening to a book to be different from reading it. I have fond childhood memories of my mother reading books (C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia in particular) to me, and the effect is remarkably different from reading them myself: you remember details differently, in a more "immediate" manner.

More recently, I had the great pleasure of hearing Yann Martel read excerpts from Life of Pi in Oxford, Mississippi in 2002, and was again struck by the kind of differences of detail between hearing Mr. Martel read it, and reading it afterwards on my way home from the reading.

I think it should matter, but that's mostly because I feel that there is a real difference in the kind of impressions you form of the text from hearing it, and the impressions you receive when reading it.