L’épée du soleil

Commentaire lucide (et donc combien utile) de Matt Kirschenbaum sur les positions extrémistes à propos de la préservation du patrimoine écrit. Il témoigne bien de la réalité actuelle : même si l’archivage électronique connaît des ratés et vieillit mal, le support papier n’est pas l’ultime solution. Tiré de la liste Humanist :

There’s often a kind of lop-sided materiality that holds sway in
discussions of digital preservation: on the one hand we’re quick to
point out how all the ugly realities of computing–the warts and
blemishes of hardware, software, and standards–conspire against the
notion of preserving anything digital; yet on the other hand,
counter-examples based on the preservation of printed artifacts tend to
come in form of idealized abstractions. “I can still read an Old English
manuscript.” Well yes, because its been kept in a climate-controlled
vault with access restricted to credentialled scholars. 500 years is an
awfully long time, no matter what the medium. Will the acid-free book on
the library shelf exist 500 years from now? Probably, if the thought
experiment consists in imagining that book in a vacuum. But think of
everything that’s being assumed here, starting with the ongoing
stability and homogeneity of “the library” as a cultural institution.
Assuming that “the library” is still recognizable as such in a few
centuries, however, it’s worth pointing out that when we want to find
the acid-free book we will do so via electronic (or maybe quantum)
records. For some this becomes the occasion, a la Nicholson Baker, for
insisting on the importance of keeping the card catalogs around; I
prefer to think of it as a reminder of what preservation really is.
We’re not dealing with a print vs. digital dichotomy here, any more than
we really were a decade ago when we liked to talk about the death of the
book and whatnot. We’re dealing with a media _ecology_ that’s in a
constant state of flux, with relations between different media shifting
and redefined through the advent of new material technologies. Any
sustainable approach to preservation, I would argue, starts with that
larger ecology, not with one specific medium or format. Matt

Nouvelle parution cet automne : Défis aux labyrinthes. Textes et lectures critiques d’Italo Calvino (2 vol., Seuil).

Compte rendu sur lemonde.fr :

Le lecteur, rien ne lui plaît finalement plus que de pouvoir admirer, et de continuer, parfois sans mots, un dialogue intérieur avec l’?uvre.

Au critique on demande de donner ses raisons, d’entrer en discussion. A fortiori au critique d’un critique.