Stephen Hickson

The latest technological innovations in media are frequently purported to supplant books. More than a century before the appearance of e-readers and audiobooks, the fervent French bibliophile Octave Uzanne (1851–1931) wrote a short story predicting that sound technology would soon render printed text obsolete. This publication recounts Uzanne’s story alongside modern speculation on the future of books. It is available as a free digital download via the Internet Archive and can be purchased as a print-on-demand book from Blurb. An audio version can also be heard on Soundcloud.