The Pleasure of Reading a Newspaper . . .

. . . the Next Day

I have subscribed to the print edition of The New York Times for some 35 years. The subscription comes with a digital version, which offers several clear advantages over paper. Onscreen, the photographs look better; the comments are accessible (to read or to write); and there are often links to earlier stories on the same subject which provide the reader with a deeper view.

Why, then, do I prefer to read the paper on paper?

For one thing, I get about twice as much news. Every story in print exists electronically, but not every story is distributed to the digital edition. Most of the stories “below the fold” on paper do not make an appearance in the digital edition.

Nor do pages 2 and 3, which provide “The Story Behind the Story,” with reporters discussing their pieces; “Facts of Interest” (fascinating factoids); “Reader Corner” and its moving “Tiny Love Stories”; and “Here to Help” (recipes, style tips, and cleaning suggestions for items I never knew needed cleaning).

 I love these pages almost as much as the Opinion pages, which do appear digitally and which, again, are not really “newsy” or time-limited. No need to read them the on very day they appear!

In general, I prefer to read on paper. Studies have shown that people remember better when they read on paper than when they read on a screen—and at this point, my memory needs all the help it can get.

The paper New York Times used to be delivered to our door every morning, usually before 8. My husband would read it at breakfast and take the rest of it to work, leaving me a section or two. Then the paper began coming later and later, sometimes after 10, and occasionally not at all. We complained but nothing changed, so we canceled our subscription. Mark began buying the paper on his way to work. It seems at once uneconomical (at $4.00 a pop) and unecological to get two paper copies, so now at the end of the day, Mark has been taking the newspaper out of his work bag and leaving it for me to read the next morning.

Yes, I begin each day with yesterday’s news. The Rolling Stones sang:

Who wants yesterday’s papers
Who wants yesterday’s girl
Who wants yesterday’s papers
Nobody in the world

Let me tell you, Mick and Keith, yesterday’s papers are just fine. First of all, many stories in the print version have already been published in the digital version, sometimes days earlier. So time is already bendable in the newspaper universe. When a story in print feels familiar to me, it’s because several days earlier I might have seen the same story digitally, through social media links. One more day-delay doesn’t make much difference.

In any event, most of the newspaper is not devoted to late-breaking news. Most NYT stories are about trends: excellent reporting on issues that have been building up for months or years. They could have been written and published last week or next week. Here are today’s, oops, Monday’s, headlines on major front-page stories (those above the fold): “Rail Funding in India Put Upkeep Last,” “Gay Activists Losing Hope in Xi’s China,” “War’s Horrors Eat into Russian Border Region,” and “Vigilantes Make Streets in Haiti Calm Yet Uneasy.” The last story opens with a description of gruesome executions on April 24. This for the June 5 paper.

What about genuine late-breaking news, fires, Trump antics, etc.? I’m likely to hear about these stories within hours from Facebook, or through watching a few minutes of TV news in the morning and evening, or from Mark, who gets NYT notifications on his oft-buzzing phone. He’ll come home and tell me, “Tina Turner died today,” and we’ll commiserate.

So I luxuriate with yesterday’s paper over breakfast and lunch, missing my daily subscription for one reason only. The NYT is delivered in thick, blue plastic bags. These are absolutely perfect for picking up our dog’s poop from the sidewalk.