Buzbee on Book LUST

For the last several days I've had the sudden and general urge to buy a new book. I've stopped off at a few bookstores around the city, and while I've looked at hundreds and hundreds of books in that time, I have not found the one book that will satisfy my urge. It's not as if I don't have anything to read; there's a tower of perfectly good unread books next to my bed, not to mention the shelves of books in the living room I've been meaning to reread. I find myself, maddeningly, hungry for the next one, as yet unknown. I no longer try to analyze this hunger; I capitulated long ago to the book lust that's afflicted me most of my life. I know enough about the course of the disease to know I'll discover something soon.”
― Lewis Buzbee, The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop: A Memoir, a History

I have to say that I have suffered from book lust from the time I first discovered libraries at the age of seven, and second hand bookshops when I was eleven. Over time I have added book sales, garage sales, charity book fairs, digital archives and of course Amazon for my Kindle requirements.

While it is a lust, I believe it is a harmless and very enjoyable one. And of course it is not all about lust, love comes into the equation as well.

Many of my happiest times have been with a book in my hand. I clearly remember going into a bookshop in Alnwick on a snowy winters day and drinking coffee and reading my purchases in front of a blazing open fire - Bliss.

Book Lust
DK

Drive traffic to your Blog

Roger Darnton on The Republic of Letters

All of us are citizens in a republic much larger than the Republic of America. It is the Republic of Letters, a realm of the mind that extends everywhere, without police, national boundaries, or disciplinary frontiers. From the age of the Enlightenment it was open to all; but only a few could exercise their citizenship, for only a minority could read or afford to buy books.

Love in the Library - the great book affair

"Libraries are where most of us really fall in love with books, where we can browse and choose on our own. It's really one of the first autonomous things we do, picking the books we want to read."

Kim Boykin

I still remember the amazement of seeing my first public library. It was not vast but to a seven year old it was a veritable treasure trove. I fell in love with the librarian that day as well. 50 years later I am still a voracious reader - Thanks Miss Arnold.

DK

DK's Top Traffic Exchanges

Reunited with Old Friends - My Books

Regular readers of this blog know that I spent three years, until October 2011, living in the UK. At the time we shifted there from New Zealand I had to leave my beloved home library behind and was only allowed, by she who must be obeyed, to take 100 of my favourite books with me. The idea was that I would buy no books and use the public library. So what happened? You guessed it, I ended up with nearly 500 new books.

I now have all my old books and new books reunited and it is just like a party or conference where you meet old friends. I forgot some of the gems I had and it has been a real pleasure opening the boxes and seeing books I had forgotten about.

I have been buying books since a chance meeting with hundreds of back editions of the Readers Digest when I was 10 years old. My books track my life as a teenager, student, young married man, father, uncle, friend, book club attender, library lover and shows my slow maturity!!

My best buy in the UK, by the way, was a first edition of Virginia Woolf's book, Flush. I discovered this in a seconhand bookshop in Alnwick (Barter Books).

Well I must go and get back to the reading.

Adios


DK

DK's Top Traffic Exchanges