Books are frozen
voices, in the same way that musical scores are frozen music.
The score is a
way of transmitting the music to someone who can play it,
releasing it into
the air where it can once more be heard.
And the black
alphabet marks on the page represent words that were once spoken,
if only in the
writer's head.
They lie there
inert until a reader comes along and transforms the letters into living sounds.
The reader is the
musician of the book: each reader may read the same text,
just as each
violinist plays the same piece,
but each
interpretation is different.
– Margaret
Atwood.