After more than two years, I have finally begun to unpack my library from storage. I'm hauling one banker's box at a time up from the garage and filling up my bookcases again. To give you a sense of what this endeavor entails, I worked for several hours yesterday, and finished A through C. (I'm beginning with fiction, the bulk of my library, which I alphabetize by author. Unsexy but effective.)
I'm struck by some things as I unpack. The first is simply how much I have missed having ready access to these books. I've gone downstairs over the years and pulled out a volume from time to time when I needed it for a review or a lesson plan. But I've missed the real pleasure of lingering in front of the shelves and letting my eyes trail randomly over titles, plucking out old favorites and forgotten pleasures.
I am also struck by what a completist I once was. If I loved an author, I had to own and read everything. And I do mean everything. It will surprise none of you that the "B" section is among the biggest, and it contains two full shelves of Banville. This is a nettlesome twitch I inherited from my father the collector. His collection of MG models was the most famous in the world, and he wasn't content with one of each type of car - he had to have one of each variation. If an MGA was made by Dinky in five colors, some with the top up, some with it down, some with two passengers, some with three, well, he had to have them all. I would watch him spend years pursuing a single, elusive variant.
I've been similarly extreme in my collecting habits, so I've got firsts and signed firsts from both the UK and US, plus paperbacks plus galleys plus the Black books and other incidentals and one-time oddities, including a short story in a 1974 issue of Argosy that Banville himself had forgotten.
And yet, as I unpack, I note that sort of excess has deserted me in recent years. James Salter is the first author in years whose entire oeuvre I felt compelled to buy and read, but one copy of each title was more than enough for me. And in truth, with the sense I have of always feeling behind in my reading, it almost seems an unforgivable luxury to commit so much time to one author.
Still, I enjoy re-enountering my obsessions of the past. Other authors who hog up such large sections of my shelves include Peter Carey and J.M. Coetzee, and so I've just been re-exposed to their long and impressive careers. I remembered the first time I read Oscar and Lucinda, who completely I fell for the work and its author. And I remembered the crushing moral weight of Disgrace, the book that launched my Coetzee mania. And I know there are others lurking in the wings as I move through the alphabet. Which I will dutifully report here.
God, I can't even imagine having so many books! I read a lot, but curiously, I dont' really like owning books - I find it oppressive for some reason. But I do envy you the chance to just run your idea down a shelf - sounds fabulous. I find my blog is kind of like my bookshelf for that reason nowadays
Posted by: Sarah Norman | February 15, 2011 at 06:55 AM
TEV, a book you ought read (I know, I know, coals to Newcastle) is Susan Hill's "Howards End is on the Landing". She deals with the "problem" you describe in an enchanting way.
Posted by: Gary | February 15, 2011 at 04:15 PM
The Kindle is really changing how I think of my library. I'm like you - with a huge physical library I've lugged around my whole life. And I'm glad I have. But I'm wondering if in the future my library will fit on a single device...I wonder what Walter Benjamin would say about that?
Posted by: Niall | February 16, 2011 at 10:24 AM
I love the title, Gary - just ordered the book. Thanks!
Niall - Or Borges, for that matter?
Posted by: TEV | February 16, 2011 at 11:13 AM
I can relate, though I'm sure I don't have one tenth the books you have. I'm in Europe going to University and I've brought quite a few of my books with me (collected a few more while I'm here, too) but even more are in boxes in storage back in the States... my parents moved in my absence and now they're even more beyond my reach...
It's a sad state of affairs, to be sure.
Posted by: Aleja | February 16, 2011 at 11:57 AM
Sorry, missed Niall's comment originally but couldn't refrain from posting again:
My father and I joke about SD cards one day being able to hold the entire Library of Congress... and how easy it would be to lose! Set it down for a second on your desk, put it in a pocket with a hole...
Posted by: Aleja | February 16, 2011 at 12:01 PM
Niall/TEV - Or Kluge? I can see the short story now: "The Pocket-Sized Library".
Posted by: Jolene | February 16, 2011 at 12:20 PM
I find I use the Kindle mainly for non-fiction. I still somehow can't see myself reading literature on it. Though I'm tempted to download "2666", if only because in book form it's so damn unwieldly.
Posted by: Niall | February 16, 2011 at 01:01 PM
Not sure though, Gary, given Mark's appreciation of Carey and Coetzee, both of whom we claim as Australian authors, that he would appreciate Susan Hill's rather glib dismissal of Australian literature on p. 70.
Posted by: melbournegirl | February 17, 2011 at 08:49 PM
P.S. I bought it for the title too!
Posted by: melbournegirl | February 17, 2011 at 09:51 PM
I wonder what happened to your father's collection. That's the thing about collections . . . what is to become of them. They take up so much space, collect dust, need to be packed and unpacked when/if one moves or dies.
Posted by: Susan Messer | February 18, 2011 at 05:41 AM
My friend A. invited me out to the Hamptons to a thing JS is doing in April at the Parrish Art Museum: http://www.parrishart.org/upcoming.asp?id=378 So I'll likely skip the Paris Review do, as now it looks as though it'll be far less scenic than my current option. Wish you could come! Do I ever.
Posted by: Lauren Cerand | February 20, 2011 at 05:09 PM
Melboumegirl, I often disagreed with Susan Hill (can't appreciated Jane Austen? Heresy!). I loved the book nonetheless. I thought it one of the most charming books I've read in years.
Posted by: Gary | February 24, 2011 at 06:52 PM
Your Banville collection is making me salivate!
Posted by: Ali Palmer | February 27, 2011 at 02:04 PM
I love pictures of bookshelves. Yours (pictures and shelves) are very nice!:)
congrats!
Posted by: Alysson Oliveira | March 16, 2011 at 12:54 PM