Pop quiz: Whose signature is the rarest in the world? Answer: William Shakespeare’s.
Yes, the playwright who created Hamlet (1603), Romeo and Juliet (1597), and King Lear (1608), irrefutable master of English literature and stronghold of the Western canon, left behind no manuscripts and no letters — no handwritten trace of his copious life’s work, unless you count the long-disputed three pages of a manuscript at the British Library referred to as “Hand D” that may very well be his. Only six confirmed Shakespearean signatures survive, all on legal documents; his will contains the two additional words “By me.”
If any fragment with Shakespeare’s handwriting came to light, it would generate international headlines, and that scrap would be worth millions. In this sense, Shakespeare truly is the “holy grail” of the rare book world — not that anyone is actively looking. Shakespeare died in 1616; as the focus of scholars, collectors, and forgers for nearly 400 years, it’s impossible that anything of his might have slipped by unnoticed.
Or is it?
On the morning of April 29, 2008, George Koppelman, a former IBM software developer who founded Cultured Oyster Books about 15 years ago, ate a late breakfast in his New York City apartment and then sat down at his desk to begin the day’s work. He logged on to eBay and input some search terms that produced a curious result: a 16-century English folio dictionary with contemporary annotations. Neat, but not necessarily remarkable. Except, said Koppelman, the annotations “seemed to me as if they were intentionally entered as poetic fragments.”
The volume was a 1580 second edition of John Baret’s Alvearie, or Quadruple Dictionarie, not a dictionary as strictly defined, but more of a polyglot’s reference — each English word is listed alongside its French, Greek, and Latin equivalents. Whoever had owned and annotated it displayed a keen interest in language, so much so that Koppelman was captivated. He called his friend, Daniel Wechsler of Sanctuary Books in New York City, and told him about the auction listing. It was premature even to utter the name Shakespeare, but between the two of them they decided that “the combination of it being an Elizabethan dictionary with at least some degree of involvement from an owner of the period was enough to spark serious interest, and we had several conversations on how much we ought to bid,” said Wechsler.
Rare booksellers hazard situations like this all the time. “We knew that there was a slight chance it could be very special, but also that there are hundreds, even thousands, of anonymously annotated books from this period that go virtually unnoticed,” said Koppelman.
They placed a high bid of $4,300 and narrowly won it. If it was the Bard’s book, it was certainly a bargain-basement price. When the bubble-wrapped folio arrived in the mail shortly thereafter, both men realized they had a long road ahead — “not days, weeks, or even months, but years,” in Wechsler’s words. As respected dealers (both members of the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America), it would have been career suicide to make any hasty pronouncements about having purchased Shakespeare’s dictionary on eBay. Instead, they discreetly dove into the type of meticulous, multifaceted research experienced almost exclusively by PhD candidates.
First, perhaps, to reconcile the history: where was Shakespeare in the 1580s, and could he have owned this book? Shakespeare was born in 1564, raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, and married, at the age of eighteen, in 1582. Few records of his life survive, so his biography is largely the work of scholarly projection. No one knows exactly when he arrived in London, but the mid-to-late 1580s is the accepted estimate. That he worked in the theater and mingled with a “literary” crowd, even among the small circle of commercial printers, is also largely believed. Adam Gopnik writes in The New Yorker, “The printer Richard Field, a fellow-Stratfordian of around the same age, whose family was closely associated with the Shakespeares, was very likely a companion in Shakespeare’s early London scuffles.” Field didn’t publish the Alvearie — though he did later print the earliest editions of Shakespeare’s two long poems, “Venus and Adonis” and “The Rape of Lucrece” — but he likely did lend the playwright editions from his shop, which he used while writing, according to another Shakespeare biographer. Educated guesswork and isolated facts they may be, but it does appear that the Bard was in the right place at the right time to have had access to the Alvearie.
Next, the booksellers explored the handwriting. Elizabethan handwriting appears peculiar, even illegible, to modern eyes. (It’s worth noting that the Wikipedia entry for paleography, the study and interpretation of historic handwriting, is illustrated by a picture of Shakespeare’s will, indicating how difficult the script is to read.) Scholars tell us that Shakespeare and his contemporaries would have used secretary hand, a loopy style accomplished with strong up and down strokes of the pen, although there is so little evidence where Shakespeare is concerned that’s it tough to pin down what his penmanship was like. The annotations in the Alvearie, however, are not in secretary hand; they are in the slightly more readable but still sloping italic hand that was just beginning to emerge. Does this alone discount Shakespeare as annotator? The booksellers argue two points: 1) the Alvearie notes are in a mixed hand, and 2) annotations by their very nature are brief, so it makes sense that the annotator would have eschewed the flourishes of secretary hand while jotting in the margins.
Koppelman and Wechsler faced the most formidable — and gratifying — challenge in analyzing the actual text of the annotations. This entailed combing through each line of text, examining every speck of inky evidence. They categorized these annotations as either “spoken” annotations, meaning the annotator added full words, and “mute” annotations, meaning the slashes, circles, and bits of underlining made by him. Additionally, one of the blank leaves at the back contains an entire page of manuscript notes — words, phrases, and translations.
And this is where it got interesting for the duo, because, as Koppelman had noted upon first viewing select annotations, there seemed to be a reason that certain words were underlined or translated. The annotations were enigmatic, but following Koppelman’s earlier hunch about the poetic nature of the fragmentary phrases, the two booksellers have been able to demonstrate connections between some of the odd words and phrases that particularly interested the annotator with similar words and phrases that crop up in Shakespeare’s work. For example, a line in Hamlet reads, “Oh that this too too solid Flesh, would melt, / Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!” The use of the word “resolve” perplexes in this context, unless you have Baret’s Alvearie handy, which defines “Thawe” as “resolve that which is frozen.” Moreover, the anonymous annotator showed his special interest in this word, inserting a “mute” annotation beside it.
The booksellers can offer up any number of such examples to prove their contention that Shakespeare himself marked up this book — the annotator’s fascination with “dive-dapper,” a small English bird that appears in Shakespeare’s “Venus and Adonis,” or how the annotator penned the weird hyphenated word Bucke-bacquet, which turns up in The Merry Wives of Windsor six times, on that blank back leaf — but it is impractical to describe the extent of their six-year investigation in a few paragraphs. Which is why they decided to write a book.
In April 2014, Koppelman and Wechsler went public with their findings. They published an illustrated book and accompanying website titled Shakespeare’s Beehive: An Annotated Elizabethan Dictionary Comes to Light, which boldly claimed that their humble copy of Baret’s Alvearie had languished in obscurity, “never previously studied or speculated upon,” and that having now been discovered and scrutinized was ready to be adored for what it was: a book annotated by Shakespeare. Their goal was to present their argument “in measured and non-polemical ways,” along with illustrations of the annotations that would invite readers to join the debate — but it was a risky proposition.
Before publication they had reached out to a small group of scholars and rare book trade colleagues and were “prepared for a variety of responses, including the most obvious one, which would be disbelief,” said Wechsler. Their reputations as rare book dealers would be put on the line. It was, said Wechsler, “an enormous risk, and that forced me to weigh all of the possibilities very carefully before I came to value the evidence in the annotations as confidently as I do.” Koppelman agreed, adding, “We would have been seriously naïve not to know what we were getting ourselves into. Neither one of us is what you would call an attention seeker.”
That said, the discovery did make international headlines, and the mixed reactions came in rather swiftly. The book world especially awaited acknowledgment from the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., home to the world’s largest collection of Shakespeare research material, including 82 First Folios. Michael Witmore, director of the Folger, and Heather Wolfe, curator of manuscripts at the Folger, issued a joint response called “Buzz or honey?” in which they wrote, “At this point, we as individual scholars feel that it is premature to join Koppelman and Wechsler in what they have described as their ‘leap of faith.’” It wasn’t an outright rebuttal; they noted that, “Shakespeare and other early modern writers used source books like the Alvearie to fire the imagination.” But proving that he used this one, they said, was going to require much more expert analysis.
Fair enough, said the booksellers. They had expected skepticism and even snap judgments, but by throwing the door wide open with a monograph that reproduces the annotations for all to see, they hoped to encourage research and debate. To that end, they update their blog with fresh insights, arguments, and counterarguments. So far, they remain confident that Shakespeare was the mystery annotator. “Of course we don’t deny the difficulty, perhaps impossibility, of ever fully proving our belief,” said Wechsler. “But we feel the argument for our conclusion has only been strengthened with new revelations and further research.”
It may be an insurmountable hurdle for some that this book — found on eBay, no less — contains the Bard’s marginalia. Had it been located in some neglected annex at the British Library, acceptance might have come more easily, but even the idea that an artifact of this caliber has been overlooked for nearly half a century is, perhaps, too much to absorb. Said Wechsler, “I think people fail to realize how many old books have survived and how many discoveries are still possible.”
Still others — a cynical crowd — might imagine that it’s all a ploy, not for fame but for financial gain. After all, if it were Shakespeare’s reference book, it would easily be worth enough to break the auction record for a printed book, currently holding at $14.2 million for the 1640 Bay Psalm Book. (The most expensive First Folio clocked in at $6.2 million, obviously without any authorial notes in manuscript — Shakespeare had been dead for seven years before this authoritative collection of his work appeared in print.) But selling the book quickly was never their aim, according to Koppelman and Wechsler. “Ideally, the book will eventually find a home as an important book in the collection of an institution such as the British Library or the Folger,” said Koppelman. “Regardless of where it goes next, we feel the most important thing is to be patient and encourage debate.”
In October of this year, 18 months after their initial announcement, the booksellers issued a second edition of their findings that includes more textual examples and “evidence that we believe is important to share and helps to solidify and advance the credibility of our arguments and our claim,” according to their blog. Readers who commit to the full 400-plus-page tome will undoubtedly credit the rigorousness of their approach and the guilelessness of their presentation.
As professional booksellers, Koppelman and Wechsler are always on the hunt for rare books. At the same time, this one was perhaps more than they bargained for. If another treasure turned up on his doorstep, what would he do? “As fulfilling as this has been, I would be tempted to put the book down, leaving the thrill of such a discovery for someone else to discover,” said Koppelman. Wechsler concurred. “I think it’s pretty safe to say I won’t ever find myself wrapped up in a find on par with this one.”
Nota Bene
It’s true, our bardolatry is such that any discovery associated with William Shakespeare makes international headlines. In November 2014, media outlets clamored to cover the news that Saint-Omer library, a small public library in northern France, near Calais, found in its collection a First Folio (1623), the first published collection of 36 (out of 38) Shakespearean plays. It appears that the Saint-Omer library inherited the book when a nearby Jesuit college was expelled from France centuries ago and left the book behind. According to professor and Folio expert Eric Rasmussen, a Folio comes to light every decade or so, but this one was particularly surprising, and in good condition, even though it lacks the portrait frontispiece that typically signposts a Folio. Like the De revolutionibus editions traced by Owen Gingerich, First Folios are closely tracked, examined, and cataloged for textual or printing variations or marginalia — this one, for example, contains stage directions and the name Nevill inscribed at the front. “It’s a little like archaeology,” James Shapiro, a Shakespeare expert at Columbia University, told The New York Times. “Where we find a folio tells us a little bit more about who was reading Shakespeare, who was valuing him.” This addition brings the total number of extant copies of the First Folio to 233.
Excerpted with permission from Rare Books Uncovered: True Stories of Fantastic Finds in Unlikely Places, to be published in December by Voyageur Press. Rare Books Uncovered contains 52 remarkable stories of rare books, manuscripts, and historical documents unearthed in barns, attics, flea markets, dumpsters, and other unexpected places.
I also felt strongly that our books revealed to visitors our values and our identities; the fact that we were swimming in them emphasized their importance in our lives. The first thing I look at when I walk into someone’s home is their bookshelf. That is, if they’ve got any–lord help me. On his goodreads profile, my friend Brian writes, “If you go home with someone, and they don’t have any books, don’t fuck ’em!” This has always struck me as wise advice for the literary bachelor or bachelorette, and I’d like to extend it further, away from the romantic and sexual: if you don’t read, I don’t want to be your friend…I don’t even want you to serve me a drink at a bar. If a stranger came over to our apartment, and there weren’t books, or–oh no!–not enough books, what would that say about me and Patrick? If my copy of Handmaid’s Tale or his copy of The Power Broker weren’t on display, how would anyone understand us? Some people have a cross in their home, or a mezuzah on their doorjamb. I’ve got nine books by Vladimir Nabokov.
So, one Sunday, we began. My first idea was that we would do each other’s dirty work. I would purge the books that belonged to Patrick, and he would purge mine. Nothing would leave the apartment without the other’s consent, but it was a good way to be objective about the matter. Patrick had no idea how much I’d enjoyed A Girl Becomes a Comma Like That, so it clearly couldn’t mean all that much to me. That stung–but he was right, and into the exit line it went.
Our best change is “The Unread” (either a book section or the latest horror flick, coming to a theatre near you). I am happy to say, it’s only a short pile, and it’s in no danger of blocking that movie poster. This pile is easy to access, and usefully recriminating; it’s difficult to defend a new book purchase when we have all of these waiting for us. Since the purge, I have already read one of these books (Arlington Park by Rachel Cusk) , and I’m halfway through another (The Unnamed by Joshua Ferris).
I understand the reluctance to get rid of books combined with the desire to keep them (and keep adding to the collection!). Here’s how I deal with it. I occasionally make a pile of all the books I 1) know I’ll never reread and 2) feel like I probably won’t need to refer to for any other purpose, and 3) don’t have some other kind of attachment to besides a generalized attachment to them because they’re my books.
Then, to ease the pain, I take them down to my favortie used book store (shout out to Kaboom here in Houston). I sell them to Kaboom for store credit. Then I buy more books!
The reason this works is that Kaboom (like all used bookstores, buys cheap and sells dear). So for me, the net quantity of books is negative–which was my goal, after all, but I still get the excitement of having some new books to read.
But I have found that there is an additional psychological benefit. If I am paying for a book with cash, I always feel like it needs to be a book that I have intended to read, that seems important to read, either because I read a great review, or its on a subject that particularly interests me, or because it’s a classic.
But when I am buying books with store credit, I feel weirdly freed to buy any book for whatever whimsical reason. Like–I like the cover. Like–Chinese history, I bet that’s interesting! Etc.
I can’t say I have drastically reduced my library by this method, but at least each trade at kaboom results in fewer total books, and often leads my reading down unexpected routes.
I have been purging my books as well. Two years ago our movers were stunned that a two bedroom house could hold as many boxes (and the resulting filled truck weigh) as much as it did. Most of those boxes were filled with books.
Last year I started weeding out books when our bookshelves would hold no more. Everyone who visits our house is offered books, and I often contribute them to local yard sales, thrift stores, and the library, but I love to pass on books by hand to those who will enjoy them.
I live in a dorm room that’s quite small, and although I’ve managed to wedge a full sized bookcase in there, I’ve had to weed out books I was absolutely sure that I wouldn’t read or read again out occasionally. Even though I know it’s not practical to keep every book I buy, it’s still a little painful. I get rid of a lot of books by giving them to people as gifts, and also on book trading sites like bookmooch.
Next time you do a purge, please get in touch with ReadThis. Our organization locates schools, daycare centers, hospitals, etc., that are in dire need of books and helps them build a library. We are currently on Facebook at ReadThis; you can see a list of the locations we have helped to date. You can also join and receive announcements when we hold book drives.
Another way to join is to email at [email protected] and ask to be put on the mailing list.
You would be amazed how many public high schools, for example, have no library of any kind and how happy they would be to receive your books.
Firstly, I am neither an asshole nor terribly witty. Secondly, I must report that Edan’s separation anxiety came to a boil the night of the purge as we were lying in bed. “I feel sad,” she told me, “like I did a bad thing.” I’m happy to say that she’s come around to my perspective, and that the purge was rejuvenating, like a colonic.
Sorry babe, could only get about two paragraphs in due to your pretentious bitchiness. I would hope that any reader OR non-reader wouldn’t be willing to be friends with such a judgmental, neurotic, materialistic snob as you. Here’s a quick wit: One can have books climbing the walls and have never opened a one, while another could have a room devoid of books and have read more than even you…how so? It’s called a LIBRARY; you’re also apparently in LA, which has one of the best and most extensive library systems in the US. Now get your head out of your ass and quit basing your identity on material things like a typical LA hipster-wannabe. Thank you and have a nice day.
the quote is john waters: http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/17366.John_Waters
We just moved recently and I have been entertaining the idea of purging as well. I have the same misgivings about getting rid of books and too, like to be surrounded by as many as my living space will hold.
However, after lifting all the boxes of books several times I am more amenable to a purge but have not done anything at this point.
I too feel the same way about bookless people. Books are the first thing I look for when entering someone’s home but most people that I know have few or no books that are visible and they can’t understand why someone would keep all those books after reading them.
I love hearing about how people manage their personal libraries. Keep ’em coming!
Thank you, Biz, for the information about ReadThis. I will keep that in mind next time around, and pass it onto my friends.
Patrick, you’re a liar.
And The Quote: thanks for correctly attributing that phrase! My mistake. My friend Brian is so funny and clever I just assumed he had written it.
SK, it’s very easy to be mean on the interwebs, as you have shown us. Thanks. For the record, I love the LA Public Library; I have a book on hold for me at my local branch right now, actually, waiting for me to pick it up (the stories of Breece D’J Pancake. Anyone read him?). Thankfully, all of my closest friends are either neurotic, judgmental, or materialistic, and can accept my human ways.
Firstly, Patrick clearly represents himself as an asshole on Tumblr. Clearly witty, though.
Unless you live above a library, the ill-natured comments above do not apply at 3 A.M. when you absolutely need to find that White Noise quote. The internet, you answer? The internet doesn’t have my underlining for ease of finding it OR my gem-like marginalia to remind me of what a silly ass I was. Then.
That said, I regret recycling/selling/giving away/throwing-away-in-anger almost every bound volume I’ve shed. My wife, son and I moved to an actual house this summer and we have room for all of our books and more.
Rent a storage unit and pile them up in wait for that beautiful day! Book owners are not like the Collyer brothers!
” ‘You’re not a librarian’ “.
Why ever can’t you be? You can be the librarian of your own personal library. My mini library is currently awaiting it’s home in my future (possibly never to be physically attained) den/office with wooden built-ins on every wall. Oh yeeeeessss, it will be wonderful!
Materialistic, sk? Oh well, books are one thing I’ve never felt guilty buying and collecting! Funny thing is, your snarky post says more about you than it actually says about this article. I don’t care how many books a person has read, if they don’t at least own a handful of their very favorites, I’d be suspicious indeed!
I moved last April and donated half of my collection, and I’m still drowning in books. What a wonderful problem to have!
I read as much as anyone I know, but I’m also a librarian…and have access to hundreds of thousands of book every day when I go to work. And because I tend to move a lot, and am not by nature sentimental…I don’t actually OWN more than 50 books (though there’s often at least 20 check-out items laying around). I have a bookcase with more Trivial Pursuits on it than books. Does that mean I don’t deserve to get laid!?
“A room without books is like a body without a soul.” Cicero.
I do book purges from time to time as well — I always keep my trusty old favorites (and new favorites too), though. And I, too, feel that my books say something important about me — for instance, if you know that I love Tennyson, E.M. Forster and PG Wodehouse, that I read literary fiction but also have a semi-secret shelf of Harry Potter books and trashy chick lit — well then, you already know quite a bit about who I am.
SK, your comments were both rude and way off-base. Maybe if she’d written an article about her giant collection of designer purses, you would have a point. But the girl is talking about books. Books! And let me also point out — while I’m a frequent visitor to the library, I also make a point of purchasing books when I can afford it. Because if no one actually buys books, there will no longer be any books to read. So, no, buying a book is not necessarily a materialistic act, because it’s partly about supporting art that you believe in and want made.
Besides, I have a feeling your comments were based more on your own insecurities than on anything Edan said in her post.
My Intro to Fiction teacher thought Breece D’J Pancake was amazing, but I don’t think anyone in the class got around to reading him during the semester. I still haven’t, probably should.
I totally agree on the Nabokov love. There are a few books I have to take with me wherever I move, no matter how tiny the room is going to be.
Thanks for writing about this Edan. I am constantly struggling with which books to keep and to not keep. I just love books! Recently though, I was the judge for a book award and I had 300 books shipped to my house and while part of me was over the moon excited, it really showed what a book “problem” I have.
I, too, have started purging. And maybe having someone help me would be the way to go because I am so slow in the getting rid of them. Because books are a painful thing to part with. Especially the ones that I want to read and still haven’t. (I’m looking at you White Noise by Delillo) (still on my bookshelf)
So I’m going through it slowly ad I have been purging in many different ways. 1) I donate age appropriate books to my neighbors, both elementary school teachers. 2) I donate to my two local LAPL branches (they’ve had their budgets cut last year) 3) I went to a book swap. Where people traded books. Delightful!
The thing that is great about book purging is that if I really find that I gave away a book that I still miss or want to re-read. I just go and buy a new copy!
And you know what they say: “clear out the old (books) to make room for the new (books).”
I have the opposite problem – I recently moved to Los Angeles and left most of my books behind in Chicago at my parent’s house. To decorate my living room I bought one of those giant IKEA bookcases – cubes, 5X5, and it is woefully unfilled that I’m actually having about half of my books sent from Chicago.
it’s a very nice feeling to have empty bookshelves, actually, waiting for them to be filled up…
I swear you guys could be me and my husband. After years of drowning in books and being sort of vaguely aesthetically pleased by the idea, we just last weekend FINALLY did the purge. We also created shelves for the unread–which are still overflowing. We’ve decided if we stop buying books and take a year off of work to read full-time, we might eventually catch up.
My True Story
I once had a library of about 1500 books. I knew this library well, had read about 2/3 of its books. Plus there was a reference section which included, for example, dictionaries in Irish and Swahili–just in case I needed to look up a word.
For many years I was an apartment manager so people were always coming into my apartment to be vetted by me and to fill out paperwork. I loved to see the look on people’s faces when they saw my walls–and this was only the 10 x 12 dining room which I used as my office. Some people walked to the bookcases and twisted their heads to start reading titles. I would mention this was the fiction room, the code that other rooms contained bookcases filled with nonfiction–which was true. Other people felt a bit intimidated and lesser-than and asked “Have you read all of these books?”
It hit me one day that I was showing off. I’m not saying other people are showing off, but I was. Definitely. It was pure ego–separate from the fact that I read a lot and have a lot of reading interests. My books on display was my bookish alpha male display. I was really upset, really really upset, when this truth hit home. All the purity of my beautiful library vanished. I had used my books in an unseemly way.
When, about 2 years later, I decided to take a leave of absence and go overseas to teach English, it made no sense to hold onto my library. I had minimal storage space in the basement of the building and needed to use it for furniture and kitchen stuff. To lighten my book load was a necessary psychological purge. I needed to get over myself. I sold about 900 and got about $1 per book–bastard bookstore guy! When I came back two years later and after six months realized I liked my life better over there, I sold everything, absolutely everything including my books.
Now it is ten years later. I’ve been back 18 months and I have started replacing some of the books I let go. The essential 200 or so. I keep book buying in check because I am poor and after all my bills are paid every month I have less than $50 in Spending Money. Seattle has a great library, as does the UW where I use someone else’s library card. Literate Seatleites have fabulous sidewalk and alley sales where one can find a Swahili dictionary for maybe $1.50. And my ego sleeps well at night.
Great read – The love for books and literature written with great humor! Reminded me of many of Anne Fadiman’s essays in Ex Libris.
Sk,
Your comment above feels logically jumbled and needlessly vituperative. Here’s a few more quick wits: Public libraries and private booksellers (and the readers who buy books from them) can and need to coexist. The work of both benefits the culture and the writers who create the books in the first place. The author doesn’t claim that the size of her private collection makes her well-read, but rather that the books she and her husband have purchased–a choice which directly contributes to the financial well-being of many writers–are simply taking up too much room in their living space. And I think the writer would gladly say that the books she reads affect her sense of identity–any curious, enthusiastic, and open reader would probably agree. Finally, it’s possible to consider books “material things,” but the values expressed in this post, and even those in your response, speak to the “special” nature of books. They are material objects whose contents can offer wonderful reading experiences. I think your anger may have led you to misread or misunderstand the intention of this post.
my family believes that a book should be shared. after we read a book we never see it again, we move it forward whether to friends, family, book club, used book store. only book that stays is the bible.
Thanks for the feedback on my comment! Perhaps it was a bit needlessly bitchy, but I stand by the sentiment. The writer wraps her identity in books as materialistic possessions; it is a materialistic pursuit, a numbers game, akin to collecting shoes or, yes, designer purses (“If a stranger came over to our apartment, and there weren’t books, or–oh no!–not enough books, what would that say about me and Patrick?). Her collection of books is not for reference, to be reread and re-enjoyed, to lend out, nor as keepsakes, as many of you seem to wrap your books; I firmly believe there is a difference here. She is literally (and literally) *hateful* to people she does not view as readers (“…if you don’t read, I don’t want to be your friend…I don’t even want you to serve me a drink at a bar.”); that is the bitchiness that I alluded to in my first post. To be hateful, elitist and possess a false sense of entitlement/superiority because you have a BOOK is ridiculous. I see the importance of the book as a collection of ideas and cultural statements intended to inform, entertain and unify; ideally, it’s not a status symbol intended to divide people or allow one person to denigrate another. And, in the interest of full disclosure, I have a fair-sized collection in my personal library (appx 1000 books, spread between two bedrooms, a garage and storage), as well as an MLIS in Reader’s Advisory (though I don’t work as a librarian yet, thanks to the lack of employment opportunities in So CA public libraries); I also sell used books online as a hobby. And, yes, I’ve been described as a voracious reader, devouring approximately 200-300 books a year, who keeps only those books in which my physical, emotional and psychological memories are wrapped. Thank you and have a wonderful day!
ReadThis! is a great program and should be your first stop for donating books that might be suitable for up to age 17. But if you’ve got lots of other books you might want to donate, The Center for Fiction will even come pick them up! Just give us a call at 212-755-6710. Or if you’d like to sell books, stop by. We price them individually, but almost always do better than $1 a book for hardcovers. And all the money we make reselling your books goes to help support our programs for emerging writers!
Oh my god, I’m on my way to Goodwill right now.
On the idea of books being a way of people seeing into your identity: perhaps having fewer books makes the significance of those you do have greater. To have Joyce but not Fielding, or Fielding but not Joyce, represents some kind of choice of emphasis, rather than just a complete spread of classics.
The overflow of books (and – whisper it! – ego!) is something I’ve tried to moderate too: letting go of them does shift some senses of obligation, and/or burden, and keeps life in perspective (at, say, two of these books a week, only a about five hundred will get read in the next five years: so which are definitely not in that 500?). Despite being a voracious reader, I’ve bought very few books over the last year, gradually trying to work away at the pile of good intentions and previous enthusiasms.
The thing I do slightly regret is telling my sister about my desire to de-clutter myself from so many books between her buying and giving me the most amazing present: a book for every year of my life so far. But I feel confident that she knows I’m grateful!
always fun seeing how others manage to remove some of the wonderful tomes! Would suggest, though, that the next time you do so, try sending some of your “moved along books” to http://www.betterworldbooks.com/ who sell ’em online for the benefit of literacy causes around the world.
I’m with you, fifi. When I finish it I share it. Why should book’s life end in my apartment? And I hear you SK, it is a pet peeve of mine to hear people judging others by what sits on their shelves. It’s kind of antithetical to the idea of enlightenment.
Thanks for the tip, Abbess. I will definitely will look into Better World Books (as well as the aforementioned Read This! that others have mentioned) when I have this problem again–and, trust me, I will have this problem again.
Thanks again to everyone for sharing their book stories with me and with The Millions.
And, for the record, I do re-read some of my books, and I often lend them out, either to students or friends. In fact, a few years ago, a friend gave me a personal library system, which comes with check-out cards, a date stamp, and even “reference” stickers. It’s great!
Personally, at the conclusion of any such book purges, I like to hand over my precious books to somebody I know will appreciate them. So the beloved school stories from my childhood went to the kid next door, while my collection of whodunits when to my tweeny cousin.
But that said, I must admit that I’m still quite a book hoarder and unfortunately, my pile of Unreads is larger than my pile of Reads.
I have a very strict, “one in, one out” policy, which especially applies to books, magazines, and clothing. If the book is in good shape, and fairly recent, I give it to my local LA public library; if it is in bad shape, old, or scandalous, I take it to the laundromat down the street, along with magazines (which I purge every six months). Many people in Los Angeles have English as a second language, and they like to practice but can’t afford to buy books or magazines.
I joined PaperbackSwap.com and it’s been great. I can post books I am willing to give up my “Bookshelf” and create a “Wish List” of books I’m interested in reading. The folks at PBS match folks — You get a credit for every book you send to another member and pay media rate postage when you ship your unwanted book to another member. You can request one book for every credit you have or you can purchase credits and request books from other members. The system works well and includes not just paperbacks, but also hardback, audio books, large print, etc. It costs nothing to join and you are given two free credits when you sign up. They also have a program that enables you to donate credits to schools in need so they can build their libraries. Try it, you might like it and you know your books are going to folks who really want them. I currently have a library of about 2500 books, but have also become a fan of Kindle (it requires no additional bookshelves).
In most cases, I give away my books as soon as I finish reading them to friends or colleagues. Why waste them on a shelf? They are no good to dust bunnies. You write beautifully.
SK- your comment still doesn’t apply. Edan’s hardly being hateful to non-book-owners. She simply says that they aren’t the sort of person she wants to spend time with.
Just as some people, for instance, might not want to spend time with people who aren’t sports fans. Or people who don’t have children. Or people who do have children. Or people who buy too many shoes. She likes to be with people who enjoy owning and reading books. She’s not saying she wants to gun down non-readers. *That* would be hateful.
And I really don’t think she’s flaunting her books. After all, she said many of her books are in her bedroom, and who goes in her bedroom besides her and Patrick?
And didn’t she purge all these books? If they were a result of her bitchy little ego, would she have done that? Unlikely.
Am starting the Great Purge myself. While it seems counter-intuitive to give away the classics, I have decided to purge first those books which are public domain (up through 1923) as they can be instantly downloaded for free on a Kindle if I ever want to re-read, check for a quote, etc.