Through one of my library newsletters I came across an interesting article yesterday, The People of the Book vs The People of the Kindle. It is not an article on the merits of digital versus print, instead it takes a different approach.
The article grew out of a friend of the author’s purging his print library because he only reads books on Kindle now. The friend had bought a new apartment and was getting ready to move. The decor of the new apartment was going to be minimalist and a large collection of books did not fit into this friend’s vision. The author understands the desire for minimalism but is still appalled at his friend being able to so easily divest himself of books. And he realizes his shock was because of how he saw the function of books:
How could a highly educated and cultured man, who’s been known to go to three Shakespeare plays in one week, get rid of his books? I had grown up assuming that book ownership was one of the signatures of an educated and cultivated person, a thoughtful person, a man or woman with concerns beyond getting and spending. When I go to someone’s home for the first time I still look at their bookcases as part of an assessment of their character. If there aren’t any bookcases, I wonder.
What used to be a sign of a person’s education and/or aspirations, the books on her bookshelf, is losing cultural relevance. The person with no bookshelves might be someone who owns a Kindle with 3,000 books on it. But whereas it is not rude to scan someone’s bookcases, it is rude to ask to see someone’s Kindle. Which I think is interesting because Kindle owners have the option of making what books they have, and any notes and highlights, available for all the world to see.
While I own a Kindle I have not done any book purging because of it. Let me take that back. I generally read public domain books on my Kindle, which means classics. Bookman and I have gone through our classics and gotten rid of a large chunk of them. Not all of them though. I have kept all my Jane Austen and Bookman has kept all his Dickens. We have kept new translations and classics we are particularly attached to or that weren’t readily available on Project Gutenberg at the time of our last weeding several years ago. But that is as far as our purging has gone.
Still, we have begun to feel a minimalist urge ourselves. We do not want to get rid of our books, though we have plans to do a “spring cleaning,” but buying for the sake of buying and owning has lost its appeal. We have become much more selective about what books we buy and have begun to use the library quite a bit more. Just because I might not want to own a book doesn’t mean I don’t want to read it. The books we tend to add to the shelves now are ones by favorite authors, are out of print, hold some special meaning, are impossible to get at the library, or might be reread or referred to again in the future. Perhaps our desire not to accumulate books willy-nilly is a result of age or an indication that we finally know what we really like to read. Whatever the reason, we still manage to buy plenty of books, still have well over 3,000 books in our house, still are never at a loss for something to read.
One doesn’t need a Kindle to scale down a personal library.
Really, the only reason to own a book is because you might re-read or refer to it in the future. Otherwise, they’re dust and silverfish attractors.
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Oh no, that’s not the only reason at all Jeanne! The books on the shelves are a consistent reminder of who you are. What I read becomes a part of me, but I can forget the details unless the books are there surrounding me, nurturing me. They are much loved objects. However, I am getting older, and downsizing is the next phase of our lives. Thanks heavens for the Kindle – I will never be destitute – but it won’t be the same.
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Jeanne, I have to agree with whisperinggums. I have books on my shelf that I have never read but still have value to me and I would never give them away – a second printing of Emily Dickinson’s first book of poetry, a school primer in German that belonged to my great-grandfather, a couple very old editions of Emerson books, things like that. One of my husband’s favorite books is Dracula and he enjoys collecting various editions of the book from the Norton Critical edition to one done with illustrations by Edward Gorey. It’s all the other books, the ones that have no additional meaning aside from having been read and enjoyed that are slowly making their way to new homes.
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I don’t think I disagree with whisperinggums, but I may aspire to more re-reading than I will ever get to.
And because you gave examples, I realize that I still have a book in Spanish that was my mother’s and that I used for my PhD language exam. I’m not really keeping that to re-read.
Truth is that I haven’t moved for more than twenty years, and the last place we lived, our housemate tossed a book by an author we both despise, and Ron fished it out of the trash!
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Heh, I aspire to more rereading than I actually do too! I’ve not moved house for 12 years and don’t plan on it any time soon. Until either of us moves we can delude ourselves as much as we want to about just how many books we own 😉
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Needless to say, I have more than one copy of every Austen novel! Mostly not fancy editions, but I still can’t bear to part with them! They’re all different and have some little history.
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I think we all have something like that on our shelves! 🙂
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I have had to scale down the number of books I buy simply because of space. I do think it’s essential to have a chair to sit in and a bed to lie in while you’re reading and for some reason The Bears are very attached to their sofa. Consequently the last book free spaces in the house are taboo as far as piling books on them goes. The e-reader came just in time as far as we are concerned.
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Alex, space it always an issue, isn’t it? Perhpas you can convince the Bears that a sofa built from piles of books with some pretty piles would be a lovely place for them to spend the day 😉
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Joseph Epstein wrote a great essay several years ago about his pruning, a big one, an acknowledgment of mortality (and of the presence of Northwestern University Library a few blocks away).
James Wood wrote a good one, too, more bitter, about dealing with his father’s books. Wood vows that he will not afflict the same burden on his own children.
Your modest efforts seem wise. It is when you move that the decisions become a little more pressing.
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Oops, Wood’s father-in-law, not his father. “Packing My Father-in-Law’s Library,” in The Fun Stuff.
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Mortality is my biggest driver … I often hope that I wan’t die prematurely leaving a mess of books (etc) that others won’t want, but I’m not ready yet for the big down-size. I am tinkering at the edges though.
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Tom, through the wonders of Google books I have found the Epstein essay which I will read forthwith. Through the wonderful library I have the Wood book making its way to me. My husband and I joke that we can’t ever move because there are too many books. When we moved into our house 12 years ago the friends who helped us carry 80 boxes of books complained mightily and we have a lot more books than that now. We have no plans to move and are still pretty young but nonetheless, it feels good to work at clearing away some of the excess.
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I’ve used the library most of my life, and I still managed to accumulate tons of books that I would never read again. I donate them to the library, the Centenary College book sale, and an assisted living facility near me.
And still…there are books and more books. Most of the ones I keep are nonfiction with a few treasured comfort reads thrown in. I love my Kindle which helps keep things under control!
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Jenclair, thank goodness for the library right? Can you imagine how many more books you’d have otherwise? 😉
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I like that – “sign of education/aspirations.” I’ve seen evidence of both over the years. Sometimes the books just look a little too perfect, a little too… unread!
I had to purge my bookshelves recently, because I’ve done two international moves. It was painful. I always imagined myself having a huge library of books, and had spent years accumulating hundreds of books, only to end up donating or selling most of them. The minimalism does feel good, but I still nurture the dream of a house with a dedicated library with floor to ceiling bookshelves one day.
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Andrew, ouch, I can imagine how much all that paring must have hurt. I hope you get your floor to ceiling bookshelves one day!
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I think I sort of agree with James Wood. I personally find it difficult to part with a book. But at my age I do worry about burdening them with getting rid of my vast collection. (and the baby grand piano made at the turn of the 20th century that my Dad gave me for my 5th birthday…yea. I wanted a doll house. Mom got me the doll house and I ignored the piano…but it’s the piano I still have and have carted all over the world with me.) I truly hope my kids will keep some of the books…but I’ve given them absolution if they get rid of everything…even the baby grand.
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Grad, a baby grand and you wanted a doll house? There is some good humor there 🙂 Since I have no children I have no feelings of guilt associated with anyone have to clean up and clear out my stuff. I do, however, want my books to go to good homes and one can’t always trust other people to do anything besides pitch them in the recycling bin. Hopefully I don’t have to really worry about that though for a very long time!
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Oh my goodness! Grad and I are the same person (except I have nieces, not children)! I’ve been dragging my century old baby grand around, too, even though I rarely play it.
I’m also at the same place you and Bookman are. Our last move made me reassess my library, so I gave about thirty boxes to my local library. When I got my Kindle, I got rid of any paperbacks that were available on Kindle, mostly classics. I don’t re-read much, so I took a hard look at the rest of my books. I kept those with sentimental value, those with monetary value, and the illustrated bindings books that are lovely to look at. I love my Kindle because it gives me a sense of freedom from guilt-inducing stacks of books. And it makes dusting easier!
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Joan, you and Grad should start a support group for people dragging around baby grands!
I’m not prepared to give away 30 boxes of book just yet, but we have stopped the mad accumulation and are now beginning to whittle it away. I do love that I can go crazy downloading classics on my Kindle and not worry about shelf space or anything else for that matter!
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I love ebooks and read primarily ebooks these days. Still, there are two ways in which I think ebooks are inferior to paper books: one is in the fact that you can’t browse someone else’s Kindle the way you browse their bookshelves, as you say. The other is that the act of gifting an ebook is not as satisfying. I think someone will eventually hit on the solution to those problems- but they haven’t yet.
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Tungsten Hippo, I know what you mean about the gifting! I gave my mom a Kindle book for Christmas and everyone else got wrapped presents and she got an email. Not quite as nice!
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I seriously need to get my eyes checked. As I first read through your posting, I thought you had said… “at the time of our first wedding several years ago” and I was like, “What? How many weddings does one need?”
WEEDINGS. I get it, now.
I have very much the same policy as you and Bookman, with my own books. I rue the day I have to move, because I have so many books — but I also tend to use the Library a lot now, and only keep books now that were either a gift to me, or have special value by way of a desire to re-read them, or refer to them in the future. The others, I tend to donate somewhere. Otherwise, it does become unreasonable after a while. And well, one just runs out of room.
And the Kindle — an amazing invention that this old dinosaur has not yet purchased.
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Cipriano, oh thank for the giggle! One wedding 22 years ago was quite enough for me! If we had to do it again we’d simply go to city hall and skip all the rest of the it. As for books and weeding, there is always the problem of space, isn’t there? Even if we did want to keep all our books it just isn’t possible. The Kindle is a pretty nifty device. It does not replace print books but it is convenient!
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I am chuckling because I read your post the same as Cipriano did. For some reason, I confuse ‘wedding’ and ‘weeding’ quite often when I read and I much prefer weedings (not the bookish kind) than weddings.
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I wrote about this on my blog last year (book purging) as my wife and I were weeding out books and we have very few books that we have to keep, to be honest. I think I can count on one hand the rare or signed editions we have…or the ones that have some kind of special meaning. I do have poetry collections and books, though, I doubt I’d be able to find on ebook at the library or would look the same on the electronic page. Overall, the book purging has been good and has allowed us to focus on what’s important to us.
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Bryan, what a nice thing to hear about the results of your book purge! I, and many others, are always afraid we will get rid of the “wrong” books or regret not having this or that, but I imagine when it comes down to it, thoughtful pruning creates no regrets.
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I’m trying to be more selective in my bookish puchases, too, but I still find I buy a lot. I do use the library loads–I tend to try out a lot of books via the library–some I read and return, others I find I don’t want to read at all so am happy not to have bought a copy and sometimes I like something so much I end up buying it. I do need to do a little pruning myself–just lack of space. I don’t think I could ever get rid of all my books–I would feel a little bereft to live in a house with no books. I return to some of them again and again and love being able to browse and look up thins or just read bits and then return the book to the shelf. But everyone has different reading habits, so whatever works be it digital or paper–as long as people are reading.
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Danielle, I’m with you, I could never get rid of all my books! And if I ever have to narrow the numbers down to one bookcase, I couldn’t do it without a whole lot of pain and suffering. But thoughtful pruning, adding shape to a collection instead of the willy-nilly state it is currently in, I think it is not a bad thing.
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I used to think I could never get rid of books but over the years I’ve come to realize that purging is ok. There are some books I don’t love and don’t have a special meaning for me so they go to the library or Half Price Books. After all, I want to make room for more books. Ha. My problem with having books on the Kindle is that I really forget what I have on there because I don’t use it too often. I need to get better about that but I just prefer the book over the Kindle.
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Iliana, it took me a long time to realize weeding books is ok too. I have a library in my basement where most of them live and whenever I visit it and actually browse the shelves I am astonished at what books I have. I begin to sound like a broken record, “Oh! I didn’t know I had this!” As for my Kindle, I couldn’t tell you what all the books on it are either! We are so naughty! 🙂
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My son once idly wondered what would happen to my books after I’m gone (I ought to cut back, but I’m not going to). He didn’t fancy being the recipient of them! So Mr Litlove suggested a book party, where everyone who came agreed to take away a crate of books. I rather like that idea. I hate to think of them being thrown into a recycling bin and would much prefer that they be read by someone who wants them. I don’t tend to keep books that I know I won’t reread now, but then working in a secondhand charity book shop, it’s easy enough to deal with them!
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Litlove, what a great idea Mr. Litlove had about a book party! How nice to know that friends and family have the chance to select from your books ones they might want to read or that mean something to them because it belonged to you! Working at a charity book shop makes it easy to get rid of your own books but I bet it also means you bring books home with you too! 🙂
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How well you know me!! 🙂
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I was not at all sure how having a Kindle would affect my book-owning habits… I’d already moved way from buying books and generally just getting them from the library. Don’t get me wrong, we have three giant FULL bookshelves full to bursting in our house (four, if you count the “cookbook” shelves) but I could easily have an entire houseful. I find that I like the kindle for books that are either too cumbersome to carry around (Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, I’m looking at you…) or what I sort of think of as “throwaway” books — books I will zip through and never read again (most contemporary novels, my book club books, etc.). Especially if I can get them for a low price or if they aren’t at my library. Those books would just take up space and I wouldn’t really enjoy hanging onto them. However, I love books and always need PLENTY in my house. I could never ever get rid of my beloved children’s book collection, or my favorites, or my camping/outdoor reference books… I’ve tried to purge my cookbook collection many times and it always seems to grow back…
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(that said, I am a SUCKER for the used-book bookstore that is INSIDE my library — the “Friends of the Library” run it and it is irresistible. Books for .50 to $2, truly great books that are obviously donated by book-lovers. I try to think of these as “rentals” and they generally get read and returned, to be sold again. Same with thrift store books… I can’t resist…. but I don’t have room for them so they live in a stack and then get put in a “book bag” in the garage. Once the bag is full it gets donated.)
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wherethereisjoy, it sounds like you have found a good balance at your house! I like your book rental system! As for purging cookbooks, never! The only ones we have gotten rid of at our house are old ones we bought in the early 90s when we first became vegan. They are so out of date now and we never make anything from them that they just took up space. Plus they were falling apart. I miss them for what they represent but as far as use goes, haven’t missed them at all.
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I’m not at the stage of wanting to stop accumulating books, although I might get there one day. The upcoming move we are contemplating certainly makes me think many times about the number of books we own! But we are moving them slowly so the job isn’t too big all at once, and in the meantime, we are still buying new books. It’s just too fun right now. But we still try to give away books now and then to keep the numbers a little lower, and maybe one day we’ll have to try Mr. Litlove’s idea of a book party. In the meantime, I just think of it as supporting independent bookstores and the publishing industry. And I do think more about buying from small presses and such rather than buying the blockbusters everyone else is buying too.
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Rebecca, I don’t envy you packing up all your books! If you have friends help you move be sure they too are book lovers and provide them lots of pizza otherwise I can say from experience you will get lots of complaints about all those boxes of books!
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I do think we become more discerning and selective as the years pass. Purchases are more carefully considered. But age and maturity produce feelings of nostalgia and all bets are off. I’ll give this article a read.
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