Chapter 4 - Section V-XI Summary and Analysis

Section V explores the impact of motion pictures as part of the Graphic Revolution on non-visual media. Boorstin describes movies as a kind of pseudo-event, especially in the sense that it was "more vivid and more impressive than the spontaneous original". The writing that movies were based on was thus giving secondary status, which Boorstin asserts, once again devalued the literary form. He goes on to say that one of the problems with movies is they feed an already "extravagant expectation of our power over the world" and allow us to believe that all experience can be fit into a movie. Boorstin suggests that we are in danger if we forget that the experiences that can't be captured by the camera are exactly those that can be captured in a book.

Section VI continues on...