I object to the title of bibliophile! [procrastination topic #2948]
I don't actually care about books.
No, no, don't run away!
BACKING UP TO EXPLAIN NOW. I've always defined myself, for lack of a more widely understood shorthand, as a a lover of books and reading. What I really mean is I don't care about the book's physical format. I do have preferences between books "bound in 1850 with spines falling off", "bound in 1960 and grungy with that ugly university bindery", "bound in 2007 never opened as a paperback" and "bound as a hardcover in 2007 and opened" and "ebook as a .pdf" and "ebook as .epub" and "printed out with 1" margins on white paper".
But what I mean is I evaluate all these on the axis of how easy they are to read.
I have terrible eyes, so reading on a computer is kind of not all that great, and makes me feel like my eyes are radioactive after too much; reading destroys my sense of time passing and so I can read for two, three, four hours at a stretch. (It doesn't stop me from consuming fic and borrowing epubs though.) I like books bound hundreds of years ago, but purely as a historian and for general wonder - look, here is a book that has passed through hundreds of years into my hands! I wonder where it's been, and who's read it, and how it has come to be here. But I don't care so much for them as a reader, because if I try to open them on my pillow (I like to read under the covers), it's sure to get grit all over the place, so I have to actually sit at my desk to do it. Hrmph! And paperbacks - you have to either break spines, or else open them a crack and cant your head one way and then the other to read them. Hardcovers are heavy to carry. The bindings on the 30-year-old books, and their dusty and dirtiness are not to be mentioned; those I have to read at my desk too.
Think of me as a vampire. The Bookish Vampire. (I am sure that will sell.) I re-read a lot, but I also have very good memory, so I need only read the book once to create a version in my head. Like I've sucked the lifeblood of the book - the ideas, the world built in there, the characters, the themes and atmosphere - and kept it inside me. The physical shell I don't care about. I like to reread, to refresh the world over, and - if the writing is enjoyable in itself - to wade through the words again. But the most important part has already been imported. Next time I have to wait for the bus, I can think of this particular book's core, or cackle, or replay events.
This is what I'd like to tell the friends I have who don't like books, and are badly puzzled by me liking books. (Also the random guy participating in the lab who was intent on psychoanalyzing me on why I didn't like movies and preferred books: seriously, lay off.) And the people who assume that since I like books, I should want to spend time in the library, or am suited to working in a library*. I like words a lot, but ultimately it's the soul of the book. I like libraries all right, but the library isn't magic in itself; it's what it houses and what it stands for that's magical. If the Library of Alexandria were still standing I would go visit - but as a historian, not as a reader; a book that came from that fabled library and from my home branch, four streets over, makes no difference to me whatsoever as a reader. All I need is the words and the things contained therein.
This is why I don't have shelves and shelves of books. In addition to having no space, little disposable income, and the necessity of moving - I just don't see the point. I can borrow from the library, and it's the exact same book. Other than to re-read, why should I keep copies of books? They're already inside me, and a book is nothing but ink and paper and paste, a physical burden that I can carry in another way.
*OK, so I do work in two separate library systems, but those don't count! It has nothing to do with my reading.
Crosspost: http://silverflight8.dreamwidth.org/115743.html.
No, no, don't run away!
BACKING UP TO EXPLAIN NOW. I've always defined myself, for lack of a more widely understood shorthand, as a a lover of books and reading. What I really mean is I don't care about the book's physical format. I do have preferences between books "bound in 1850 with spines falling off", "bound in 1960 and grungy with that ugly university bindery", "bound in 2007 never opened as a paperback" and "bound as a hardcover in 2007 and opened" and "ebook as a .pdf" and "ebook as .epub" and "printed out with 1" margins on white paper".
But what I mean is I evaluate all these on the axis of how easy they are to read.
I have terrible eyes, so reading on a computer is kind of not all that great, and makes me feel like my eyes are radioactive after too much; reading destroys my sense of time passing and so I can read for two, three, four hours at a stretch. (It doesn't stop me from consuming fic and borrowing epubs though.) I like books bound hundreds of years ago, but purely as a historian and for general wonder - look, here is a book that has passed through hundreds of years into my hands! I wonder where it's been, and who's read it, and how it has come to be here. But I don't care so much for them as a reader, because if I try to open them on my pillow (I like to read under the covers), it's sure to get grit all over the place, so I have to actually sit at my desk to do it. Hrmph! And paperbacks - you have to either break spines, or else open them a crack and cant your head one way and then the other to read them. Hardcovers are heavy to carry. The bindings on the 30-year-old books, and their dusty and dirtiness are not to be mentioned; those I have to read at my desk too.
Think of me as a vampire. The Bookish Vampire. (I am sure that will sell.) I re-read a lot, but I also have very good memory, so I need only read the book once to create a version in my head. Like I've sucked the lifeblood of the book - the ideas, the world built in there, the characters, the themes and atmosphere - and kept it inside me. The physical shell I don't care about. I like to reread, to refresh the world over, and - if the writing is enjoyable in itself - to wade through the words again. But the most important part has already been imported. Next time I have to wait for the bus, I can think of this particular book's core, or cackle, or replay events.
This is what I'd like to tell the friends I have who don't like books, and are badly puzzled by me liking books. (Also the random guy participating in the lab who was intent on psychoanalyzing me on why I didn't like movies and preferred books: seriously, lay off.) And the people who assume that since I like books, I should want to spend time in the library, or am suited to working in a library*. I like words a lot, but ultimately it's the soul of the book. I like libraries all right, but the library isn't magic in itself; it's what it houses and what it stands for that's magical. If the Library of Alexandria were still standing I would go visit - but as a historian, not as a reader; a book that came from that fabled library and from my home branch, four streets over, makes no difference to me whatsoever as a reader. All I need is the words and the things contained therein.
This is why I don't have shelves and shelves of books. In addition to having no space, little disposable income, and the necessity of moving - I just don't see the point. I can borrow from the library, and it's the exact same book. Other than to re-read, why should I keep copies of books? They're already inside me, and a book is nothing but ink and paper and paste, a physical burden that I can carry in another way.
*OK, so I do work in two separate library systems, but those don't count! It has nothing to do with my reading.
Crosspost: http://silverflight8.dreamwidth.org/115743.html.