In the Roman Empire, owning a vast and extravagant library was a status symbol. The elite would amass mountains of scrolls and piles of books not only to read but to display as a signifier of wealth and intellect, and wealth of intellect. Lucian of Samosata, the satirical writer of the second century AD, compared folk who did so to “an ass listening to a lyre” in his essay Adversus Indoctum or The Ignorant Book Collector. Oh, what Lucian would have made of Instagram…
The social media platform has long served as an exercise in personal branding, where what you’re reading is part and parcel of who you are – or want to be perceived as. In recent weeks, Instagram has rolled out a feature that makes it more visible than ever: a banner that allows users to display a book title at the top of their profile (albeit with a 20-character limit.) Telling people you read Ulysses just got that much easier.
