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4.05 AVERAGE
4.05 AVERAGE
relaxing
medium-paced
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
slow-paced
emotional
funny
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
A book for book lovers about owning books, shelving books, buying books and reading books in the place where they are set. This is a thoroughly enjoyable meta book.
reflective
slow-paced
A lovely little book about all things bookish. Growing up in a privileged, literary family, Anne has been a lifelong bibliophile. 18 essays in all, I most enjoyed "Ancestral Castles" where as a child Anne built houses out her Dad's 22-volume Anthony Trollope collection. In "Marrying Libraries" she talks about merging library's with her equally-bookish new husband. In "Never Do That to a Book" the pros and cons of writing in the margins and dog-earing books are debated.
Favourite anecdote - "When 18th century London bookseller James Lackington was a young man, his wife sent him out on Christmas Eve with a half-crown - all they had - to buy Christmas dinner. He passed a bookshop and returned home with Young's "Night Thoughts" in his pocket and no turkey under his arm. "I think I have acted wisely" he told his famished wife, "for had I bought dinner we would have eaten it tomorrow and the pleasure would soon be over, but should we live 50 years longer, we shall still have "Night Thoughts" to feast upon".
Favourite anecdote - "When 18th century London bookseller James Lackington was a young man, his wife sent him out on Christmas Eve with a half-crown - all they had - to buy Christmas dinner. He passed a bookshop and returned home with Young's "Night Thoughts" in his pocket and no turkey under his arm. "I think I have acted wisely" he told his famished wife, "for had I bought dinner we would have eaten it tomorrow and the pleasure would soon be over, but should we live 50 years longer, we shall still have "Night Thoughts" to feast upon".
This is a gratifying book for people who love books. It's very affirming to have someone care as much about reading books as you yourself might. Fadiman covers a broad array of the ways we interact with books and, potentially, how many of us define our identities by them. This book revels in the loaded history we might have with our books, the intensity of our feelings about marginal commentary, the taken-for-granite minutiae that seem to codify what it means to be a capital-R Reader.
There were definitely times that Fadiman came off as competitive and times she seemed to cast herself as the precocious ingénue, but I say that knowing I do that day to day in my life so I mean, sinners casting stones here. All the essays in the book are short, so even when you get into ones where you might disagree with the way she treats reading (I know some people would get up-in-arms about writing in a book, or others who won't ever buy second-hand, or what have you), it's never going to be that long a section, and she's usually pretty good at relaying stories from friends or colleagues with the opposing view.
Having just started library school, there were a lot of things I made mental note of and that I will plunder and recite back in classes, from questions of copyright and theft to the Virginia Woolf book that she quotes in the beginning. Woolf's [b:The Common Reader|18840|The Common Reader|Virginia Woolf|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1423877141s/18840.jpg|2684550] is really the chief book added to my to-read list, which surprised me because I expected to approach Ex Libris as I did Alan Bennett's [b:The Uncommon Reader|1096390|The Uncommon Reader|Alan Bennett|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1317064291s/1096390.jpg|1792422], as a resource for further titles to acquire. I knew most of the works she cited, had read a lot of them, and those I hadn't read I've got no great interest to read. Trollope can wait, as far as I'm concerned.
This book also scored points because not only do I now attempt to read 50/50 women/men authored books, but I'm trying to add more non-fiction to my repertoire. This is still so literary, but it can be my gateway.
There were definitely times that Fadiman came off as competitive and times she seemed to cast herself as the precocious ingénue, but I say that knowing I do that day to day in my life so I mean, sinners casting stones here. All the essays in the book are short, so even when you get into ones where you might disagree with the way she treats reading (I know some people would get up-in-arms about writing in a book, or others who won't ever buy second-hand, or what have you), it's never going to be that long a section, and she's usually pretty good at relaying stories from friends or colleagues with the opposing view.
Having just started library school, there were a lot of things I made mental note of and that I will plunder and recite back in classes, from questions of copyright and theft to the Virginia Woolf book that she quotes in the beginning. Woolf's [b:The Common Reader|18840|The Common Reader|Virginia Woolf|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1423877141s/18840.jpg|2684550] is really the chief book added to my to-read list, which surprised me because I expected to approach Ex Libris as I did Alan Bennett's [b:The Uncommon Reader|1096390|The Uncommon Reader|Alan Bennett|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1317064291s/1096390.jpg|1792422], as a resource for further titles to acquire. I knew most of the works she cited, had read a lot of them, and those I hadn't read I've got no great interest to read. Trollope can wait, as far as I'm concerned.
This book also scored points because not only do I now attempt to read 50/50 women/men authored books, but I'm trying to add more non-fiction to my repertoire. This is still so literary, but it can be my gateway.
I often find books about books difficult because the author isn't writing about books that I know or love. This book, however, is less about specific books than about the personal love of books that the author has and how this love developed. It spoke to me in a way that other of the same genre haven't
Read for the LitLife Challenge 2021
16. Any Book Mentioned on the Podcast
This book succesfully got me out of my reading slump, it seems, and I was impatient to finish it.
Most of essays in this book were funny and relatable, others not so. I understand why some people found this book obnoxious but she just was trying to be relatable for the most part, since people who claim to love books are seen as excentric anyway.
I think it should go as a warning that while this book is not excessively inappropiate, it is for adults though most sexual references are just kind of... ridiculous and anecdotical
I also was a little worried by the fact that her father owned Fanny Hill in the first place and didn't keep it away from her as firmly as he should have. I think she tried this for relatability points, since we all have come across an inappropiate book in one way or another. But it was disturbing to think about
There was an essay about a book the only Catholic member of the family owned, one of those books on womanhood which, I guess, point given, can be a bit too much sometimes, but I've seen more proliferation of these on protestant communities and, to be fair, she's far more lenient to men of past times and acknowledges they aren't necessarily sexist, just not as used to women's presence in public life.
16. Any Book Mentioned on the Podcast
This book succesfully got me out of my reading slump, it seems, and I was impatient to finish it.
Most of essays in this book were funny and relatable, others not so. I understand why some people found this book obnoxious but she just was trying to be relatable for the most part, since people who claim to love books are seen as excentric anyway.
I think it should go as a warning that while this book is not excessively inappropiate, it is for adults though most sexual references are just kind of... ridiculous and anecdotical
Spoiler
I honestly was annoyed with her trying to convince her husband about what extremely cold places had going for her by comparing them to the body of an actressI also was a little worried by the fact that her father owned Fanny Hill in the first place and didn't keep it away from her as firmly as he should have. I think she tried this for relatability points, since we all have come across an inappropiate book in one way or another. But it was disturbing to think about
There was an essay about a book the only Catholic member of the family owned, one of those books on womanhood which, I guess, point given, can be a bit too much sometimes, but I've seen more proliferation of these on protestant communities and, to be fair, she's far more lenient to men of past times and acknowledges they aren't necessarily sexist, just not as used to women's presence in public life.