ex libris: my own confessions

Or, Anne Fadiman and I Sure Seem to Have a Lot in Common

I recently read the book Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman and really, REALLY enjoyed it. The book is a collection of essays on reading and each time I started a new one I found myself almost audibly thinking, “No way! Me too!!” If Ms. Fadiman and I could sit down and chat about a handful of her essays over lunch in New York coffee shop, this might be what I’d tell her:

“Marrying Libraries”

I remember when Blake and I married our two independently large book collections into one massive library. We, too, were hesitant to do so and quibbled over the best way to organize it. Do we organize by topic? By author? And how do we reconcile the fact that I like books to appear “looked at” (or messy, as Blake would say) while he likes books to be perfectly aligned and pristine (or unloved, as I would say). Lack of space keeps us from the Ideal Arrangement, which is probably categorized a little like the Library of Congress and a little like a used bookstore, so right now it’s a little bit of both. But someday, someday…

“Scorn Not the Sonnet”

Do you think that all great writers have to pass through a murky veil of bad poetry writing? Part of me hopes so because if that’s truly the case, judging by the poetry I’ve written in my lifetime, I’m well on my way to becoming a great writer.

“Never Do That to a Book”

I think I fall somewhere between a courtly lover of books and a carnal lover of books. The division would probably fall 70/30 in favor of carnal love. I like the spines and pages of the books I read to prove the fact that I read – and loved – them. But even though I find the idea terribly romantic, I don’t yet feel good about scribbling my thoughts in the margins of my books. Blake, on the other hand, is strictly a courtly lover, which sometimes makes me afraid to pick up and thumb through his collection.

“Words on a Flyleaf”

One of my favorite flyleaf inscriptions was in my mother’s copy of Charlotte’s Web. It was written by her roommate who, somewhere along the way (whether it was before or after the book was given, I’m not sure) became her sister-in-law. I wish I could remember exactly what it said, but all that my memory affords me is that it was as cleverly written as Charlotte’s web messages for Wilbur were. Blake once spent a long time trying to write the perfect inscription in a copy of Pablo Neruda’s poetry that he gave me for my birthday a few months before we were married. “And it was at that age…I found you, the poetry of my life,” he wrote. A little cheesy, yes, but given the circumstances of twitterpated engagement, it couldn’t have been anything less.

“You Are There”

I love it when life allows me the opportunity to read a book in the location it was written, inspired by, or set in. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn has been my favorite book since I was about thirteen, and each time I read it I craved to be Francie, reading my well-worn copy on a fire escape in Brooklyn as I occasionally gazed up through the branches of a cement-blossomed Tree of Heaven. Now that I’ve suddenly found myself a resident of Brooklyn, with a fire escape to boot, I think another re-reading of this favorite is definitely in order.

r/ “Inse^t a Carrot” e/

Though I very certainly make grammar mistakes of my own, I, too, can’t help but find myself automatically proofreading every book, newspaper, menu, flier, or letter that I happen to read. It’s like some sort of unstoppable tick. Have you seen the blog called The “Blog” of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks? I have a feeling you’d get a kick out of it.

“Eternal Ink”

When I was an adolescent I wanted nothing more than be an Austen-esque fountain pen owner. Now that I’m married to a husband who is so devoted to the world of antiqued writing that he owns four and uses them all interchangeably, I’ve realized I don’t really harbor any special affections for fountain pens. The pens I prefer typically are accidentally stolen store pens with business logos printed along the sides because, for reasons I still don’t understand, it is always those pens that work better than the package of Bics I pick up occasionally from the office supply store.

“The Catalogical Imperative”

I read books, newspapers, magazines, blogs, emails, and letters. And I also read catalogs (while meantime wondering how the heck we ended up on their mailing list), cereal boxes, shampoo bottles, phone books, and instruction manuals. What can I say? It’s addictive, this reading habit.

“My Ancestral Castles”

While I didn’t actually build castles with books, I did discover at a very early age that books held down the corners of our blanket forts incredibly well. Those same massive volumes, I learned later, were college textbooks belonging to my parents. Whenever I’m afforded a chance to visit the shelves I grew up with, I love to gaze at them and pick apart the people who purchased the books sitting lovingly on them. And I’m always pleasantly surprised by what I uncover about those two people, who taught me that loving to read was vital to my well-being, when I pull a volume off the shelf and thumb through it.

“Sharing the Mayhem”

Most of my childhood memories of reading take place either on the couch or my parent’s bed as I sit snuggled next to my mother while she read out loud to my brothers and I. When the certificates from the summer reading programs we participated in at our local library say that we read 96 books, it actually means that mom read 96 books, out loud, to us. When we were very young (and even as we grew older) it was picture books: Caps for Sale, The Story About Ping, Make Way for Ducklings, Ferdinand. And once we no longer required pictures to entertain us we dabbled in chapter books: Mr. Popper’s Penguins, The Story of Holly and Ivy, and My Father’s Dragon. I only hope that I can read out loud to my children with as much enthusiasm and voice as mama did when she read out loud to us.

“The P.M.’s Empire of Books”

If you ever track down another copy of On Books and the Housing of Them, let me know. Or maybe I should just see if the BYU library has it on the rolling shelves that were apparently inspired by Mr. Gladstone’s organizational ideas.

“Secondhand Prose”

As my kindred spirit and fellow reader, Emily, can also attest, there is nothing quite like wandering the aisles (if you can even call them that) of that hole-in-the-wall used bookstore in Provo, Pioneer Books. I’m not sure if it’s the musty smell or the fact that the owner can locate just about anything in that mess of a shop, but there’s something incredibly alluring about that place. As I thumb through the editions and volumes stacked on the shelves (if you can even call them that), I am simultaneously amazed that people actually wanted to get rid of these and consumed with a feeling of overwhelming good luck that for a bit of loose change, they could be mine.