Reviewer: Steven K. Szmutko
Ewing, New Jersey

It is a sheer delight to read a book in which the author's passion and enthusiasm leaps forth from virtually every page. I was recently given the opportunity to read this book and have ambled leisurely through each page, gaining new insights for the motivation of young people, raised in a society characterized by visual bombardment, to discover or rediscover the love of learning from books. The author presents a compelling case for the development of books grow beyond the written word toward a total verbal/visual experience. However, just as impressive as Ms. Kirschenbaum's thoughtful presentation of her ideas, is the infusion of her actual person, her essence as it were, into each chapter of the book: her life, her dreams, and her passions. There are very few nonfiction books - or for that matter, many books - where so much of the author's inner being is revealed; how much more remarkable it is in a subject where one would normally expect the dry, black-and-white dustiness of academic theory. Ms. Kirschenbaum clearly has a number of fine ideas, which she conveys in a thoroughly engaging manner.

Goodbye Gutenberg is visually impressive, yet the particulars of the graphic design are not mere ornamentation. Rather, they have been carefully chosen to illustrate the power of communication to the reader through the use of color, font, style variation, and imagery. Too often, as the author discusses, the use of color and design have been belittled by so-called academics as mind candy for lesser-lights (my words, not hers), not appropriate for the bright or serious student. Ivory tower types, who bask in the pale light of the status-quo, view color, design and illustration as tools or gimmicks, not worthy of serious work. I often laugh when I read how these same characters, legends in their own mind, lament that their often tedious theories and works are never embraced by large numbers of people, despite their self-apparent wit and brilliance. Consider such things as home and gardening books, cookbooks, children's books and other pictorial texts. They are often richly illustrated and designed, beautiful in construction and feel - and yet are often scoffed as less sophisticated. However, these same books, precisely because of the engagement of the visual and the verbal, are picked up again and again by their owners, unlike "more serious literature," which is read once, at best, then relegated to the bookshelf (or worse, to the recycling bin).

As an aside, years ago, my mother (an occasional part-time teacher) was asked to tutor individual students who were having difficulties in reading. She brought in my old comic books and magazines. Her philosophy was to give the students something they wanted to read, so that their enthusiasm would be sparked - analogous to using newspaper and kindling to entice a reluctant campfire to a cheery blaze. Her students responded enthusiastically, "at last, something we LIKE to read." Most improved their skills dramatically and several have even become successful as educators. The author takes this simple approach - give the kids something they would like to read - to an entirely new level.

Ms. Kirschenbaum's ideas encourage the simultaneous engagement of ALL of the senses in inspiring and motivating her students. "How do we get students to WANT to read?" is the key question. She asserts that to have a lasting impact, you must communicate in the vernacular of the day. And what is this vernacular? Television, music videos, computer and video games? These are things which can stimulate all of the senses - but, because they are generally passive, often fall far short of fostering creativity and imagination. Books, because they require discipline, particularly in intellectual works, can be infinitely more rewarding - IF THEY ARE READ. The author provides both a wonderful way to write for today's author, as well as a solid methodology to encourage young readers in an ear of visual dominance.

The author's research of the use of color and design in the pre-Gutenberg and post-Gutenberg period is richly comprehensive. While she laments the decline of color and design in books, she recognizes that, as books were previously a scarce commodity for the affluent, the invention of the printing press did enable books to become available to the masses - although at a cost. Ms. Kirschenbaum notes that with the advent of computer and printing technology, color and design can easily be integrated into books, just as color, sound, and computerized special effects have taken motion pictures to incredible levels.

One particular chapter stands out. Chapter 28: Writing in the Color of the Stars is a delightful essay on the art and passion of writing from a deeply personal level. Ms. Kirschenbaum is wandering through New York City, looking at the great buildings. "Each building is a galaxy, each window is a star. In them I see the silhouettes of young men and women, the dreamers of my generation. Their candles burn at both ends, as Edna St. Vincent Millay would like to say, but they will last, last way beyond midnight. They fill me with a sense of awe and pride; in their 20s and 30s now, they are bursting with energy and mad with ambition."

Goodbye Gutenberg contains remarkable insight into how to touch the lives of students, the dreamers of the next generation.

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