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Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader
by Anne Fadiman
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.