The Printed Page

There seems something sacred about about keeping old magazines.

You keep them on a shelf so that you can take them out whenever you need to refer to them again. Not like a book, but in the way, you remember an article or face or drawing, and you need to see it again. A book is always there but magazines are or seem to be for the time being.

When they're on the shelf you keep them there for that purpose, just in case. But after some time you start to need the space, so you remove the older ones. Either to a cupboard or floor or on top of something, just so they are out of the way but still easy to get to. You might suddenly think, 'oh damn, I need that issue back' and then have to fetch it from wherever you've stashed it.

For time passes and they gather dust. It's time to move them again. This time to a box or draw, somewhere out of sight. But you know where they are if you need them. You start to buy newer issues, maybe even new magazines. Your loyalty to this particular magazine is waning. You miss a few issues but you still catch up with articles on the website. Yet something is lost. You don't hold the printed page in your hand, you can't smell that 'new magazine smell'. You just look at a screen.

Years have gone by now. You've started to throw things away to make room for new things. You find your old magazines and unceremoniously put them in boxes or maybe straight into the bin. You might end up regretting that.

Then one day, you look throw boxes in an attic/shed/garage or even just your old room and you come across that box full of these magazines. You can't believe you still have them. You think, maybe its time to throw them all away. But wait, not yet. You sit down and look through them all, you cut bits out that you want. You might filter out the stack but still, a few remain, those memories of the printed page. Weekly, monthy, yearly, you still want to hang on to them.

I did.

Empire magazine. Every issue (but one) since December 2003.