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mayastone 's review for:
A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books
by Nicholas A. Basbanes
DID NOT FINISH
This book is for a very select type of person. I quit halfway through because I started skimming through all the pages.
If you are looking for a collection of stories involving people who love books and the great lengths they’d go to get them this isn’t the book as far as I’ve read. If, however, you are looking for a book about rich people buying special edition books and in many cases not reading them, just to decorate their homes, then this would hold your attention.
The positive side of this is that it did highlight the importance of personal libraries in the preservation of rare texts, which is a fair point to make. Aside from the opening sequence there was a story of a monk who killed eight people to get to books, which was more in line with what I was seeking.
Everything else was just rich people spending money, with the occasional historical tragedy wherein books suffered ( ie the library of Alexandria and when Henry VIII wanted a divorce etc).
I feel like the book could be cut in half and still get through it’s message.
1/5 - Perhaps I’ll finish this some other time.
If you are looking for a collection of stories involving people who love books and the great lengths they’d go to get them this isn’t the book as far as I’ve read. If, however, you are looking for a book about rich people buying special edition books and in many cases not reading them, just to decorate their homes, then this would hold your attention.
The positive side of this is that it did highlight the importance of personal libraries in the preservation of rare texts, which is a fair point to make. Aside from the opening sequence there was a story of a monk who killed eight people to get to books, which was more in line with what I was seeking.
Everything else was just rich people spending money, with the occasional historical tragedy wherein books suffered ( ie the library of Alexandria and when Henry VIII wanted a divorce etc).
I feel like the book could be cut in half and still get through it’s message.
1/5 - Perhaps I’ll finish this some other time.