How — and Why — to Cull Your Book Collection. “6. I have to give up on some of my little projects.” (I am mid-cull right now, making some tough calls. But also: many books I haven’t so much as touched in 10 years.)
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“5. Sometimes new information really can change my feelings about an author.
Which is to say I’ve kept the two Alice Munro story collections that are dearest to me, but the rest are being donated.”
this spring I packed up a box of well loved Gaiman, Rowling, and yes Monroe etc. and put them in the basement. Seeing them everyday was making me sad now, no matter how once they’d given me joy.
I got rid of almost all of my Gaiman. Not quite ready to part with Sandman, but I have it stored where I can't see it.
I am trying to find a way to see how much it would cost me to replace, rather than cull, some (most?) of the books with ePub versions that I could also send to my Kindle. It's the _text_ I love, not the physical objects
Thanks for sharing that. I have never thought of that before, so it is interesting to hear someone say it out loud.
Books are like trees for me. Even if you could provide me with oxygen and shade by building a perfect "tree machine," I would never be able to learn to love an eTree. But I am sentimental (and have room, almost, for all my books)
In fact, some books, the ones I love the most, are purchased in various editions, old and new, signed and unsigned, hardback and dog-eared paperbacks...
And the text doesn't die when you stop owning it. Whether it's data on a local drive or in the cloud, is it any less yours? I don't know the answer but I'm fascinated by the question of what it means to "own" bits of data. Besides, worst case, if I want to re-read a book I really like, why not send the author more money? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I did something similar years ago. I found ePub versions of most but not all of the 3,000 books that donated.
There are good library apps, like libby, that allow you to "borrow" many books for free. There's also piracy, which is free, too.
We've been mostly doing our culling lately by focusing on the books our kids are aging out of. We still are keeping many kids books that are favorites, but we've needed to free up space for all the new books we all bring home.
A lot of my books are graphic design related, related to odd subjects I had to research before the internet (vintage cigarette packs, firecracker packaging) or related to hobbies I no longer have (sneaker collecting). I’ve actually sold quite a few of these kinds of books. My literary books I just donate to the local library. I do need a culling though.
Living in a small Brooklyn apartment, my wife and I have to be ruthless about books. These days I feel as though I have rewired my entire value system to the point that passing a book along to be enjoyed elsewhere is more appealing than keeping a copy on the shelf where it won't.
I think of it as putting the object where it can cause the most happiness. Feels good!
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