Re: Book Hoarding
 

I have a problem with piles of books on my floor. At the weekend, I finally got round to plucking some books off my shelf and putting them in a box to store in the garage and filling the gaps with books from the floor. I won't say which books I put in the garage, partly because some of them were of living authors or had been gifts from the uninformed, and partly because I don't now remember, but it wasn't easy either to make the resolution in the first place or to choose the individual books.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

When I was talking about a will, I didn't necessarily mean for family and friends but perhaps sympathetic dealers and shops who would be glad to have them. Or is posting a huge book collection for miles, or even across states beyond what you're allowed to instruct?

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I don't know. That had not occurred to me. My emotion on this is to give something meaningful to someone meaningful, but if there is no interest then a sympathetic book dealer would be better than nothing. A warning to book dealers: Be good to me from now on! :D

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With my schedule, I have almost zero time to read more than a half hour or so a day. Hence, audiobooks have been a lifesaver.

Being trapped inside my car for three hours six days a week is now three hours six days a week that I spend "reading." I've absorbed dozens and dozens of books I simply would never have read - or prioritized to read, considering the "real" reading I do is mostly devoted to reading the work of colleagues for reviews, blurbs, genuine interest, etc. - by listening to audiobooks picked up at a number of local libraries.

It's allowed me to fill in all those gaps of renowned or "classic" literature that I never read back in school, or read so quickly for a class that I didn't fully retain the overall text.

Considering the thread topic, audiobooks don't really stack well on shelves, though. :)

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I actually overlooked the benefits of using audiobooks.

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It seems weird at first, or like a cheat, or not fully experiencing the book in the proper way (and it probably is, as you don't get to run your eyes over the words and the way certain writers present their sentences), but once you get into the flow of it, it becomes a habit, and a blessing.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Kevin,

Interesting reflections in your post. But I'm not sure about the part where you say that Millennials' rejection of the past is "not necessarily a good or a bad thing." Come on my friend, you are too kind--don't be afraid to be a little judgmental here! Of course it's a bad thing!

Mr. Veech,

While your points about the Founders being slave-holding, leisured aristocrats are well-taken, you have to remember that most of them were also workaholics--even by today's standards. Jefferson was a Virginia delegate at the same time that he was managing his private estate--and simultaneously pursuing every topic under the sun. Adams was a lawyer and farmer, Madison was always busy with something, and, of course, Franklin's pathological addiction to work is well-documented, etc. etc.

My point being that there is almost always time to read if it is important enough to a person. Similarly, I recall Lord Chesterfield reminding his son in their correspondence not to neglect the time spent on the toilet every morning, and to utilize those precious moments for reading the reflections of some great man!

At any rate, even for someone with "no time to spare", there are still countless books on tape that can be checked out at the library for free. So that's at least an hour a day for the average person's commute to work. Which is more than sufficient time to acquire a reasonably good education over a span of years.

What's more, I wonder how many hours even the most rabid corporate climber in this country spends anesthetized in front of the TV? I can't find the video on YouTube, but there's one where Noam Chomsky talks about how 80 or so years ago (long before Netflix!), the British working class attained an impressively high degree of culture and education, and was thoroughly conversant with the Great Books. I'll post the video if I can dig it up, but I thought that was rather interesting.

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T.E. Grau,

I see that I repeated your points about libraries and audiobooks. Funny, but I wrote that before reading your post!

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Sorry to revive a point from yesterday.
I worked in a music shop for fifteen years and staffing problems were similar.
When I hired on, most of the crew were versed about specific genres, eras, group members, etc ...
Several played in bands, everyone went to clubs.
In the final years, new hires knew top 10 radio hits.
Or they downloaded and "owned" tens of thousands of albums, but rarely listened to any.
They simply had no knowledge, nor were they interested.
I came to the conclusion that when goods are free, they lose value.

Bookshops?
My area has only one (dying) NEW chain front, and one USED chain front that stocks middle of the road titles.
It is what it is.

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I'll be so arrogant and presumptuous as to say "great minds..." :)

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I've never tried to put together a good selection of books, a respectable home library. The books I've amassed reflect my own hodgepodge of idiosyncrasies, and when I look at them I see the messy history of my various interests. I have a few rare books, but I'm not a collector; I just look for decent reading copies. To value this particular assortment, you would have to be me.

My books are emphatically not for show. No one ever comes up here except those I can't refuse entry to (landlady, maintenance workers, inspectors). Even my few living relatives don't visit me here; I visit them. On the rare occasion that someone pauses to look at my shelves, I tense up and say something, anything to try to distract them. What titles are they noticing, and what do those titles say to them about me? It's nerve-racking. And what if they pick up a book to look at it, and it's one of the books with my doofus pencilings inside? That would be mortifying. Because of my sensitivity about this, if I had a spacious house, I wouldn't want a huge, manorial library room; I would want my library to be a warren of small rooms, some of which could be closed off, with perhaps even a hidden room or two. No, I don't have a collection of bizarre erotica or anything like that. I just tend to be secretive.

I've realized I can't concern myself with what will happen to my books after my death. They will most likely be carted off by strangers, and what will be done with them is out of my hands.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

"Kevin,

Interesting reflections in your post. But I'm not sure about the part where you say that Millennials' rejection of the past is "not necessarily a good or a bad thing." Come on my friend, you are too kind--don't be afraid to be a little judgmental here! Of course it's a bad thing!"

Ahem. Well, a close reading of my posts in this thread will make it obvious where my sympathies lie. But the 2016 presidential election took its toll: I'm so throughly tired of judgements and rants that I tread cautiously, perhaps to my detriment.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

I was born on the cusp of Generation X and the Millennials, and I think I have the millennial mindset when it comes to personal possessions. I've always preferred the library to owning my own books. Even years after I graduated, I used to spend off days and evenings at my university's library - it was situated in a five story tower overlooking a section of the campus given over to parkland, so I would sit at a window reading in hour long sessions with half hour walks or dining in between. And if the library didn't carry something, inter-library loans gave me access to every college and university library in the state - which meant that if it was a work of non-fiction and published within the last century I could get my hands on it. At the time, my personal book collection was maybe forty books that I acquired because I constantly reread or studied them - mostly mathematics and philosophy, with the fiction almost entirely composed of the Del Rey Lovecraft and Howard series.

As ebooks gained in popularity, the university not only started shrinking the physical stacks, but opened up the floor space with more group study tables and computer banks, essentially converting the library into a student lounge. As probably the case with any TLO member, the library's increasingly extroverted character didn't suit me, and I dislike reading ebooks, so I stopped going to the library and started buying more books. But as much as I admire books, owning them induces a considerable amount of anxiety in me because I obsess over dust, fading, shelf-wear, folded pages etc. I also move quite a bit, and am in fact set to move in two weeks, which makes packing them a constant hassle - especially as to I individually wrap my hardcovers in tissue paper and bubble wrap anytime I pack them. If it wasn't for the fact that public libraries carry too limited of a selection for me and university libraries seem to be turning into multimedia labs, I'd readily sell off most of my non-mathematics books, only holding onto a couple of showpiece items I've acquired.

There were a few used book stores that I frequented in Toledo and Detroit - long since closed - but I don't have much nostalgia for them. Even with the most laid back and helpful owners and staff, they're still there to get you to buy things, whereas libraries are sanctuaries that exist solely for reading. The last used bookstore I visited was, ironically enough, The Last Bookstore in downtown LA, and I found it too noisy and eclectic to make a habit of visiting. I order online directly from publishers, Ebay, and Ziesing.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

This thread has far and away been the most interesting and enlightening I have seen here for some time. That's not to say the others aren't very good, they are. But the stories I have read here fascinate me to no end and says a lot about our TLO members. The remarks here have been deeply personal and well written. I just want to thank you all for your candor.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

One way of getting rid of books you have read is to pass them along to friends and family, but this is becoming more and more difficult as the years go on. As I have posted before, my offspring are not readers of books, and finding people who appreciate getting lost in a good book is like searching for an extinct species. At least that has been my experience where I live...a Caribbean island that is a backwater of the American Dream (read Nightmare).
Necessity is the mother of invention, so I am playing around with the idea of taking a few of my read books, the ones I can part with, go to my local shopping mall, and just leave them at benches or tables at the food court in an inauspicious way so people can find them and be pleasantly surprised. Of course they could still end up in a landfill if nobody picks them up and the janitors do their job, but at least...anyway it is an idea.

"Between the two enemy religions it would be unwise to imagine a watertight barrier.Men passed to and
fro, indifferent to frontiers and states, and creeds.They were more aware of the necessities of shipping
and trade, the hazards of war and piracy, the opportunities for complicity and betrayal."
-Fernand Braudel
The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II

I am not sure what this quote by the great historian Braudel has to do with what I have mentioned above, but Millennials be wary, when you least expect it, something you treasure will end, and lamentations will ensue to a world that does not see you.

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This is a fascinating subject, I have been collecting books for many years now, but I tended to impulse buy a lot of books when I had a bit of money. For example, I bought the entire Wheel of Time series in hardback at a local thrift store, and after reading the first book, I found that I did not like it. Recently I have been going over my collection and selling off unwanted volumes, like The Wheel of Time series, but it hits me that I too often purchase books on impulse. I often bought three or more books by an author before I had read anything of him/her. I’m trying to get rid of this bad habit and just purchase books I know I’m going to read, and maybe check out one book at a time by new authors. As I have started to frequent TLO and Goodreads actively, my to-read pile has just exploded, and I fear that soon space will become a very real issue for me as well.
The subject of hoarding or collecting leads me to a question. I have no system at all in my bookshelves, some Lovecraftian/mythos books are together, but mostly its pandemonium. Each time I set out to rectify this, I get overwhelmed and feel that they should just stand where they are (the same goes for my DVDs and Records as well). Yes, a bad case of OCD right there I should think. But my question is this to all you other hoarders/collectors: How do you arrange your bookshelves, and do you have any tips about this for a neurotic Norwegian?

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Good question.

I strive to strike an OCD balance between over- and under-systematizing. So: I roughly group books by theme (horror, cultural history, biography) then keep all of an author's works together. That's about as far as it goes. My goal is to be able to find something if I'm looking for it and achieve some kind of basic logic. I also need to be able to move authors around a bit without reorganizing my whole library.

But as far as arranging books chronologically or authors alphabetically goes: No.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

I've the same problem of buying on impulse, only that I buy nonfiction instead of series books. For some inexplicable reason, I'd get hyped over a subject and buy 4 or 5 books on it. After the books arrive, my interests also vanish with all money spent.

For organization, I put the book in either Weird,Russian, Fiction, or Nonfiction categories. After that the books organize themselves. Over half of my fiction books are Western/Eastern classic, the other half are "complainers" (in broadest term) ranting about the inanity, misery, and wretchedness of life. That section continues to expand.

Right now I'm trying to interweave fiction and non-fiction reading so I can get rid of the extras.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Like others here, I have an unsettling amount of books.
I know that I shall not live long enough to read them all.
Nevertheless, I still buy.
The Brantley thread, however, is an uncomfortable reminder.

http://www.ligotti.net/showthread.php?t=11983

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Thanks for your input, this seems like a pretty decent way of orginzing my books, I will give this a try.

That is unfortunate, I’m still think I will be able to finish reading what I have accumulated so far, but as I purchase 5-6 new volumes for very one I read, it’s a losing battle. The Brantley thread is a sad reminder that all our passions might be a solitary endeavor that others might be uninterested in. I have not given much thought as to what to do with my books after I pass on. My wife and I don’t want children, so maybe we will end up donating them or something.
This reminds me of a video I found on youtube:

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I sold all my academic books because they reminded me of my ex. I did keep the works of Schopenhauer, the only philosopher really worth his salt.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Given the breadth of her literary knowledge (both historical and stylistic) evidenced in her writing, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the percentage of her library that remained unread at the time of her passing was less than what one might guess.

Unfortunately, I, like you Zaharoff, acquire books at a rate that far outpaces the rate at which I read them. As far as library organization goes, I'm reminded of Caddyshack:
"[If you don't keep score h]ow do you measure yourself against other golfers?"
"...By height?"

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Below, a PDF of a work I read last night under the title, 'Postscript to a Catalogue on a Collection of Bronze and Stone Inscriptions'. The translation is supposedly the same (that of Lin Yutang), but I see that as well as the title, one or two other things are different. The author is the poetess Li Qingzhao (also known by other names - Li Yi-an, Yi'an Jushi). She and her husband were well known collectors of objets d'art and books back in the twelfth century. She writes here of events at around the collapse of the Northern Song Dynasty:


"The following year, we came down south on the occasion of the funeral for his mother."

In the book I have a footnote says of this line: "Of course they fled for another more imperious reason, the fall of North China. But to ascribe it to the occasion of a mother's funeral is accepted as the correct way of saying it. Likewise, it is highly improbable that her husband, son of a minister, had to "pawn clothing" to buy old curios, as said at the beginning, but this is also accepted as the poetic way of saying it. It has become the tradition for scholars to say that one's wife took off a gold brooch from her hair to sell it for money with which to buy wine to entertain a friend for the night."

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Typical event for the hoarder.
I decided, once again, I needed to reorganize.
Actually, Zelda told me to build another bookcase.
So, after construction, I began loading by press ...
and soon noticed there were 3 - 4 titles missing.
While my storage, especially temp storage, can be a bit suspect,
my record keeping is usually stellar.
I scoured the other bookcases multiple times.
Then opened and emptied, over and over, the - ahem - cardboard boxes.
I found one lost sheep. The others? No dice.
I know they are around.
Stupid collector, cannot keep track of what he has.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

Looking up pictures of book hoards online, I ran across the following article about the late scholar Stephen Medcalf: http://www.bibleofbritishtaste.com/s...edcalfs-books/

For much of the past decade my apartment has looked something like the pictures of Medcalf's abode in that article. One problem--not the only problem--with such piles of books is that no matter how carefully you pick through them, they have a tendency to start cascading.

While reading the article, I suddenly realized: Hey, I own a book by this guy! (Of course I do.) And I don't know for sure where it is right now. (Of course I don't.) How utterly fitting.

As I recall, I ordered the book after reading an interesting review-essay about Medcalf in The New Criterion (unfortunately there is a paywall at this link after the first few sentences): Truthful myths | The New Criterion

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How about being in the mood to read a certain book that you know you have somewhere... You spend hours looking for it and when you finally find it you are too tired, disgusted, or have lost interest in reading it.

or

Wanting to read a book that you know you have, again, somewhere. But, hell, you can pick up another copy for less than $5 postpaid on AbeBooks and that beats the hell out of wasting your life looking for a stupid book. Thank You! Order Placed.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

I sympathise, my experience recently is searching as much as reading... working more on a mnemonic "memory cathedral" Method of loci - Wikipedia (this has a nice intrinsic failure/loss of the least memorable works - my spatial memory is crap but verbal/numerical is excellent - however video game locations - central yharnam, hemwick etc. can work as a cross over) or just using a good AI/operating system agent when it becomes available is an option - curate the hoard as best as possible till then

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZiUCp66jZv.../leafdrift.jpg

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I've heard this "memory palace" before, but didn't know it was real. I may try this using places in Morrowind to practice (I'm bad with real world locations). Most of the time, the method I've unconsciously employed is to remember a detail of the thing I'm supposed to remember and then use this clue to find the culprit. It works well with books and movies. I don't keep a record but so far no "lost sheep. I sometimes keep my money in books, so I would go crazy if a book is missing for unexplained reason.

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I have a fascination with books mentioned in novels or movies. I remember reading a great deal of The Art of Memory by Frances A. Yates, that I requested through the interlibrary loan system years ago, because it was named by the character Hannibal Lecter in one of the Thomas Harris novels. The ideas were completely unknown to me at the time. Intriguing stuff.

Hannibal Lecter, Mnemonist - Art of Memory Blog

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I also saw it there.

But previously in Crowley's - Little Big

and he is very much aquainted with Bruno

Giordano Brunos Memory System - Art of Memory Blog

(my memory is incredibly bad - hence the interest)

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I find moving greatly exacerbates this problem. I moved 2 months ago, and I still have all my books scattered across my floor in random piles while my bookcases remain empty because just thinking about organizing them exhausts me. I bought 2 new books last week and just threw them on a random pile. Funnily enough, I still know the exact location of every book from memory when I was sorting them for packing. I still have old textbooks from college, and even found two library books I rented in high school for a paper I had to write on female serial killers. That was almost 20 years ago.

Re: Book Hoarding
 

I suppose in the last couple years I've started engaging in this little hobby. It's not my first foray into the wonderful world of hoarding, in fact I come from a distinguished line of collectors, re-users and savers; three generations to be exact. Anyways, there were these two wonderful used bookstores right next door to one another downtown, not too far from where I live. The younger of the two, Pearsons Twice Sold Tales, closed year before last, and I found myself buying from them compulsively every week. The senior of the two, The Yesteryear Shoppe, announced they were closing last year, and I did the same thing. I'm sure I spent hundreds of dollars, and purchased countless books of fantasy, philosophy, mythology and whatever else struck my fancy... My (limited) shelf space has become uncomfortably crowded since then.

On a semi-related note, I am now more or less forced to buy books through online suppliers. I dislike this very much, but there simply are no more brick and mortar book stores near me. The convenience is nice I suppose, but the mystique is just not there. Nothing quite like an old used book store, full of hidden gems yellowed from time- waiting for you to discover them. Walking past those towering shelves, scanning volumes for something you've been looking for- or maybe something you didn't even know you needed... until that moment.

It's a terrible time to be a romantic, or an antiquarian for that matter.

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I always struggle with where to store my books and always end up giving some away, donating, and/or going to the used book store to trade. But the books keep growing. We even have books in plastic tubs down in the basement because there’s no room for them.

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My closets have more books in them than clothes. Once I looked for a book I wanted to read, but couldn't find it. I ended up going online and ordering it. Later, after a few months, I found the mislayed book while looking for another one. Talk about the hoarding blues.....

How can you control yourself, master your behavior, when you come from a country where people howl at funerals.
-E.M. Cioran

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I’m a bit of a book hoarder. I have loads of books and when I - hopefully finally - move out of my parents house the thought of transporting them without breaking them fills me with dread.

My hardback copy of the Gormenghast Books is like a bible to me - I know that’s beyond stupid - and I couldn’t cope if it got ruined.

My book buying upsets my Dad who often bemoans that I don’t have ‘normal’ interests like football and things even the books I buy a weird and strange because he’s never heard of them. He once saw the cover of D.P. Watt’s Almost Insentient Almost Divine and said it was creepy.

I’m currently trying to stop myself purchasing the Everyman Classics editions of Thomas Mann. They have: Magic Mountain, Buddenbrooks, Collected Stories, Faust and Joseph and His Brothers. It would set me back nearly £100 and I still have a never ending TBR pile.

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It is 100% awesome to treat a hardback Gormenghast copy as a Bible.

And I don't call it book hoarding, I call it "preparing for the decline of Western Civilization." Like the Book People in Fahrenheit 451. Viva la Revolucion

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I see.my book hoarding in a way like the medieval monks saw ancient manuscripts, a way to conserve a light of knowledge, even though weird knowledge, in the increasing darkness of creeping fascism. My book hoard is my monastery.

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I really like that idea but I don’t have an actual library they’re just sort of haphazardly scattered.

I do really love the idea though, it makes me feel a bit like Bede!

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I don't have a lot of room. My "study"has two bookcases full to bursting. All my other books are scattered about the house, mostly inside closets and cubberts, sort of like in the original movie Fahrenheit 451. I fantasize building a separate library annex to the house, but I don't hold my breath. As I've said before there are more books than clothes in my closets.

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Not having space, and not having time to read books I already own, I've been buying fewer books recently. I tell myself to hold off purchasing this or that book until I'm living in a larger place. But rent is rising fast in the town where I live, so when will I ever be living in a larger place? Save for retirement or live in a larger place--that's a stark either/or.

In the meantime, I occasionally feel compelled to buy this or that particular book for true hoarding purpose. I spot a book that I think I might want in the future--no time to read it now, but it's out of print and used copies are scarce, so naturally I must buy a copy immediately. Or I see a new book that I might want in my future of fantasied leisure, and it's the kind of book that will likely go out of print and never be reprinted; obviously buying it now is the only sensible thing to do.

An example of the former: I really enjoyed William S. Wilson's collection Why I Don't Write Like Franz Kafka, and I saw that he had published one novel, long out of print, called Birthplace: Moving Into Nearness. A few used copies were still available at reasonable price. Snagged it.

An example of the latter: I was enticed by rave reviews of the recently published Questioning Minds: The Letters of Guy Davenport and Hugh Kenner, but I wondered if I'd ever find time to read this trove. So I was going to pass on it for now. But then I realized: this looks like the kind of thing (boxed, two-volume set) that may never be reprinted and that will shortly be unavailable except for expensive used copies. I was already half-regretting not buying Arno Schmidt's massive typescript-novel Bottom's Dream when I had the chance. So... I received the Davenport/Kenner boxed set yesterday, two oversized, 1,000-page volumes of fine print, extensively footnoted and indexed. Incredible. Where am I going to put it and when am I going to read it?

The realities of future book (un)availability make this sort of hoarding necessary, right?