We're closing on our new house Thursday and moving Friday. So, yay, it's been a long road.
However, this necessitates the re-evaluation and streamlining of all our possessions, and I've got, as usual, a metric ton of books. Already, I parse my 6 bookshelves a couple of times a year, making titles earn their places by memory, sentiment, inspiration, envy, association, reference value, or pure enjoyment. And still they multiply. New ones appear atop my to-be-read pile as fast as foliage on a magic beanstalk.
But I am not alone. Here's a librarian complaining about how hard it is to throw away books when civic-minded people keep returning them from the back Dumpster; and Buce from Underbelly argues with his Mrs. over whether he should be allowed to keep 2,000 books or 3,000.
I have had to get over my aversion to putting titles down the chute. My emotion's a combination of karmic distress and outright lust. Not to say the garbage is my first resort. I've just sent 40 pounds of Primo Prose overseas to people desperate for diversion. (Apparently, arguing with real estate attorneys makes me giddy for alliteration. I apologize for the splatter.) I've donated piles to libraries, hospitals, and senior centers, abandoned them in airports as my own anonymous BookCrossing. But there are some weird and awful titles I have collected that I can't imagine any reader enjoying or needing- sadly, these are often titles I receive for review. And there are others that I just don't have the time (or ebay-centric inclination) for which to find the perfect home.
When there are more books being printed than ever before, except in cases of true rarities or beauties close to my heart, I'm trying to get over the sense of their preciousness before I'm smothered. A book shouldn't represent a guilty obligation either to readership or stewardship, despite the niggling of my outmoded conscience.
I assume the authors of these unwanted tomes are just as hopeful and well-intentioned as I, but some fruits of their labors are going down, down, down, bumping down 28 floors of metal shaft to the building compactor. And I feel low, low, low about it. But way better than if I'd hauled that crap around forever.
Can you bear to throw books away?
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Tossing Your Titles: A Timely Topic
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9 comments:
Nope, I can't. I do the books overseas thing, the BookMooch thing (and I give my "points" to charities like Books for Hospitals and Books for Prisons), the BookCrossing thing, even Goodwill and library sales. (If you can get enough books together, the library a half hour from me will come and pick them up.)
And that's just the paperbacks.
I also go for Craigslist. You can usually find people on there who are willing to take your books in bulk. I have no idea what they do with them, but I've done it a few times.
Clare, congrats on buying the house. It's gorgeous. I wish you a long and happy life in it.
As to books: About ten years ago I broke my ankle and was trapped in the house for a week or so. I spent the time deciding who I wanted to have what after I was dead. When I mentioned this to my daughter, she said, "Mom when you die, we're throwing all this stuff out."
And I thought, "they're going to throw away my books. How could they?"
About the "stuff" in general, I had an epiphany. If they are going to throw it all away after the funeral, why don't I throw it away before? So that's what I do. Every week or so, I throw something out. Ah, but the books . . .
My gym has a book exchange so I drop books off there and try not to bring home too many new ones. I keep all the gym books together in a crate so I make sure they leave my house.
My "do gooder" book thing is www.readertoreader.org a terrific organization that sends books to economically depressed libraries. They also have helped a lot of libraries that lost all their books in Hurricane Katrina.
Take a look at the site and if you can't send books, send money.
(Note to self--make this a blog topic in a few months.)
Terrie
Nothing like moving to realize how much stuff one actually does own.
Congrats on the house!
You found the prettiest house in three states!
I seem to be the only one who can't seem to let books go at all. And each year it seems I'm spending more and more money buying new ones. I thought it was lucky we had a big house and could bring every last one of them with us when we moved here. We've accumulated three times the number now, and I'm starting to feel hemmed in. I haven't yet begun stacking them in aisles in the living room, and I have promised my husband that if it comes to that we will let them go.
Another good tip for book dispersal, Terrie, though I hesitate to send a public library my Black Art of Death, a thin martial arts-type manual with only killing moves. Don't ask...oh yeah, I'm keeping that one. Watch out, burglars.
Aw shucks, Lois, you're too kind.
Thanks everyone for the nice words and good wishes. Women of Mystery BBQ?!
Our local library system has designated one library as the place to drop off used books and then sells them. I buy hardcover books for between $1 and $2 and the library must have tens of thousands of titles on hand at any given moment.
The stock is eclectic but what a great deal. The library takes any kind of book.
Maybe your local library system would be interested
Thanks for bringing up the topic - and for doing such a bang-up job with your postings! (The photos aren't merely great visual hooks, they are vision-expanders on multiple levels. I swear I can hear back-up music when I come upon your postings!)
Back to the book conundrum, do you think I'll be arrested if I give away books with an old stamp indicating which high school I lifted it from while teaching there?
But I gathered the suggestions from your responders and hope to do a little sharing of the wealth soon.
Write On!
Nan
Get rid...of books? What is this of which you speak?
I can't even give away books I don't like. It's just physically impossible for me, I cramp up and start hyperventilating. I must have some condition, or something. Even the awful textbooks my school makes me buy. I still have them all.
I keep stubbing my toes on piles of books, though, so I guess I should move to a bigger place.
Well, it's nice not to feel alone in my throes. My library has, out of self-defense, gotten stricter about what they'll take. I need to sneak to another township.
Tx, Nan, I'll try to keep the theme songs coming.
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