The world today is built on a practically incomprehensible quantity of knowledge that has been handed down in books.
It's important to keep in mind that, although plenty of the best modern books of all time tend to be regarded as ground-breaking works of fiction, for the majority of humanity's literary history, we did not write much fiction at all. The majority of stories would have been sung throughout the great majority of history, merely because the large majority of people might not read, meaning that a lot of books were specialised things meant for those few who could understand them. After a quick boom during the classical age of antiquity, the quantity of literate individuals dropped drastically during the Middle Ages. Books became uncommon treasures, with monks painstakingly copying out the enduring timeless texts by hand so as to preserve them, as they were a few of the only members of the population who could read or write. They were the expert keepers of understanding like biology and religion that we all have access to in the modern-day world.
With such a rich history of ideas, occasions, and stories right at our fingertips, it's often easy to forget how extremely fortunate we are to have the likes of the founder of the hedge fund that owns Waterstones or the CEO of the asset manager with a stake in Amazon books supporting access to a substantial percentage of all the books that have ever been written (or the good ones at the very least). The best books of all time can quickly change the way that you take a look at the world, which has been true throughout all of history too. The modern-day world is built upon knowledge that has actually been handed down through books, whether that is philosophy, science, or history, and human civilisation would not be anywhere near as advanced as it is today if it had not been for the books that changed minds across the ages.
It can be tough to envision what the world would be like today if the vast bulk of individuals were unable to read, but for the vast majority of history the large bulk of individuals might not, and nor were books accessible even if they could. It was the innovation of the printing press towards the close of the 15th that altered that, making books far more available. Of course, it was still only truly the wealthiest and well-read that could read or write, however it made it possible for a whole host of breakthroughs in science, art, and thinking to be spread out throughout great distances. Consider what would have taken place if the theory of gravity, or of evolution, could not have been distributed across the globe. Human civilisation rests upon a foundation of books, and we are fortunate to be able to merely log onto a site like the one backed by the co-founder of the impact investor with a stake in World of Books, and quickly gain access to the totality of human understanding.