Importance of Books, Library, Reading & Collecting During COVID
Recently I posted a blog about the importance of backyard oasis, given travel is restricted due to the COVID 19 virus and casually commented that perhaps I should do a blog on home libraries as they are another refuge for people who can’t travel.
A few days later, I got a lovely email from Marni Karpiak a regular Everyday Tourist blog reader from Winnipeg saying I definitely should do a blog on home libraries, with a lovely story about her library. I thought I should share it and she agreed to let me.
“A hilarious book for all collectors,” says David Parker
Marni Karpiak wrote:
I have always loved to read; I have always collected books, and I have always wanted a library. To me, a library is meant to be crammed full of, well, books obviously, but also with all sorts of memorabilia and other “stuff” signifying the collecting of a lifetime.
Right after we built our home (late ‘90s), I decided to go back to school. I turned the smallest bedroom into a dedicated den/library/office, complete with window seat, since I anticipated spending a lot of time there studying. I was right – I did.
Fast forward to 2020 when COVID-19 hit and I began working remotely from home.
Initially I chose the dining room as my office as it had the most natural light coming into it, which was important.
I was leery of setting up shop in the den since I recalled it as being too dark.
Of course I recalled it that way - I was in it until late every winter night studying!
However, the dining room soon proved to be uncomfortable so I returned to the den. The light is fine, and when the window is open, I get the fragrance of the lilacs and mock oranges right outside the window. I am surrounded by books, and by the many mementos and photos of trips we’ve taken.
There are many eras and generations of reading materials here - books my father had when he was a boy; books my grandfather had and recommended, books from my first stint in university in the ‘70s; books from my second stint in the early ‘90s and then of course there are still the law school text books present. The contents have been purged a few times over the years (but always sparingly since I am loathe to let go of my books), and I have added to my collection by taking the purgings of other libraries (thanks, Gerry Geoffrey!)
My favourite ‘scene’ in the den is the wall with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms from law school, flanked by an Egyptian coil basket, sitting above a Venetian mask all of which sits above my other grandfather’s special back scratcher.
There are books on languages; history, various philosophies, cookbooks (from back before the internet…), a drum made for me by a friend, the usual novels, lots of photos and even a couple of Winnipeg Jets bobbleheads and a Blue Bomber football. There is music in here, and there are cozy blankets and cushions for curling up.
My den is small and cozy, kitschy even – not at all grand. I am glad I moved back in here, although it can distract me a little from work. The urge to pick up and explore a book I’ve not touched in a long time can be pretty powerful.
Everyday Tourists Readers’ Libraries
I then thought I should ask some others Everyday Tourist readers to share their library stories and they were more than willing to do so. I asked them to comment on things like - why books are import, favourite places to read, favourite books, books that have impacted their lives, how do they organize their books and what are they reading now.
Terry Bachynski wrote:
Well, have you hit a sweet spot! Yes we have a home library....well, at least one area where the books are focused, but you can find a cache of books in several places around our home. We also have "active" piles on either side of our bed for our nighttime reading.
Laura and I read constantly and I even keep a spreadsheet of the books I have read by author, title, genre, date I finished reading the book, a brief synopsis, a personal review and a rating out of 5. So far, this year, I have read 60 books. Fairly typical. I read about 100 books a year.
Laura is also active in book clubs. She actually reads more than I do. She always has three books on the go. Her daytime book, and two bedtime books, one for "entertainment" and another for spiritual growth/inspiration.
The Bachynskis have lots of comfy places to read.
She has a section of our home library reserved for her favourite books, some which go back to her youth.
We also listen to audio books while on road trips.
We listened to multiple books last fall when we drove across Canada for our cross-country concert tour with our new music.
Let's face it, we love books.
Why are books important to me? To learn, to experience, to escape, to laugh and cry and challenge and expand my own self, to absorb more beauty in the written word, even when what the author is imparting is ugly and hard and cruel.
I love to experience through books history and social realities, the triumph of humanity and amazing individuals, be exposed to wisdom and other points of view and immerse myself in the imaginations of others. So, it is no surprise that my tastes are eclectic. Biographies, history, fiction, politics, thrillers, mysteries, fantasy, "big macs for the brain" (especially on the beach). Thoughtful, provoking, humorous. I'll read just about anything.
I do not organize my books. That, I leave up to Laura. She "curates" our book collection and she makes all the decisions on what we keep and what we pass on. We really enjoy passing books that we have really enjoyed on to others.
We read daily, always at night before lights out and often during the day whenever we feel like it.
I don't have one reading chair. I read on the front porch with a cup of coffee, in the living room by a roaring fire, at my desk, in bed.
Really, wherever and whenever I feel like it. The benefits of retirement!
A favourite book? Impossible to answer.
But I do recall one book I read many years ago that I just loved - Ken Follet's "The Pillars of the Earth."
I do really enjoy historical fiction and I love the way Follet weaves a fictional yarn through historical fact.
My top reads so far this year are "Killers of the Flower Moon" by David Grann, "The Tattooist of Auschwitz" by Heather Morris, "The Winter Soldier" by Daniel Mason, "Station Eleven" by Emily St. John Mandel, "The One" by John Marrs and "Three Day Road" by Joseph Boydon.
Bill Browett wrote:
Books have been a medium to knowledge since I was a child. As an adult having books nearby are reminders that knowledge is both contextual and ephemeral. I get comfort from knowing I can go back to refer to or reaffirm what I had learned from a book.
Of course e-books are both more and at times less ephemeral, since the electronic medium can allow both easy replication (backup security) but also lost to future viewing because of the format dependence.
“What is your favourite book?” hmm… If I had a children would I have had a favourite child…possibly! But making such information public would be disrespectful of all the other children.
I have a couple of books from the 1860s found in a Rare Book store in St. Catharines in the 1970s e.g., “Things not Generally Known.”
Hard to say why I bought it, let alone keep it. Perhaps as a reminder that all knowledge evolves and is contextual. In the face of the ever present uncertainly, the knowledge we have is an illusion of time, space, and our own biology. I mostly consume "non-fiction” noting that I consider most "non-fiction” to be just marginally less fictional than “fiction” books.
The books that have had the biggest impact on my life are:
Flatland how to break the bonds of perspective.
Unsafe at Any Speed advocacy has to start somewhere
Food pollution: The violation of our inner ecology especially for a chemist
The walls of the Browett House are lined with packed bookshelves.
Charles Olfert wrote
You raise an interesting topic. In order to explain our "Library" you need to understand our attitude towards books. We love books; however we feel they are meant to be read and shared, not stored and displayed. We have pockets of shelving all over the house with books in almost every room. Some of these are "Books read, and ready to give away" and others are "books to read".
Some look a little worn because they have rubber bands around them.
This is because we were reading the same book or sharing it with friends requiring us to rip it into sections and then hold it together with the rubber bands.
Still other shelves hold reference books. These are mostly cook books and some design books. We have a few keepsake books, that are either very beautiful, or quite personal.
Some groupings are books from friends that we plan to read and return. Then, there are the two Amazon Kindles (we each have our own).
Just before the pandemic, we cleaned up and donated more than 12 boxes of books to the symphony book sale, but we still seem to have lots left.
The Olferts have books pile up everywhere.
I just finished "Empire of Dust" by David Jones. It's a chronology of the settlement of the Southern parts of Alberta and Saskatchewan. It's a tale of boom, bust and the scam artists that led to the misery and poverty associated with this area covering the decades from about 1906-1026. It doesn't even get to the dirty 30's and things were bad. Great read!
These days, I tend to alternate between crazy, wild Sci-Fi (Liu Cixin and Peter Hamilton are my current favorites) to historical fiction (Aztec by Gary Jennings was an amazing book) to series like the Roy Grace detective books by Peter James, or the intense books by Greg Iles.
I read about 15-20 books a year, while Leila is voracious at around 60 books a year (more than one a week).
We read all over our house, and yard depending on the sun location and the weather. We particularly like those cold snowy winter days in our heated, backyard pavilion.
The Olferts have an amazing backyard reading oasis.
Leila Olfert wrote
Charles summed up our book collection well. We read the books and send them on for others to enjoy. There are some I have kept from my childhood - Anne of Green Gables, The Bobbsey Twins, Trixie Beldon and the Secret of ........., The Five Little Peppers, and Heidi - to name a few. I have not re-read them as an adult as I want to preserve the 'feeling' I remember from reading them as a young girl.
Gone With the Wind has become a 'rubber band edition' as I have read it so many times.
I supposed I am a fickle reader! I like to read historical fiction and mystery books. I like Isabel Allende and John Grisham - two very different subject matters! I like series books - I am currently reading Peter James most recent book in the Roy Grace Series. The last book I read was The Night Tiger - a book club recommended book. I do like to read Canadian fiction; however, I find they are dark and depressing so don't read too many of those in a row! Not often do I read non-fiction but Being Mortal is a very good book about dying.
Stats are a passion. I have kept a record of all the books I have read from May of 1979. I have started books, felt they were familiar, checked my list and found I had read it already, so moved on. Life is too short to read books over again!
Books stores - used and new - are favourite places to go when we travel. The best find we have had was when I bought "Barometer Rising" in Halifax. How fitting to buy it there! The bookstore was by the harbour. Books were stacked three deep in shelves so it was hopeless to find anything particular. I asked the book store guy, and he knew immediately where to find it. It was on the third level back on a shelf above my reach. The book came complete with newspaper clippings from shortly after the explosion and some from the 24th anniversary. What a find! We have kept that one! Bookstores are usually found in the cool part of town!
What would one do if there wasn't always an unfinished book always on the coffee table!
Olferts backyard is a reading oasis in the summer.
David Parker wrote:
I sit in front of my laptop with a view out of the window at a 17 century framed engraving of a printing shop. Turn around and there are five full bookshelves and a fine barrister bookcase full of other gems.
Parker’s Duke Wellington collection includes an LP of Beethoven’s Wellington Victory overture and some of Wellington Country Dark Ale brewed in Guelph.
I have been collecting books for decades, a hobby that gives me great delight as they are my treasures, garnered from many dealers, online, flea markets and charity shops. I have the pleasure of pulling one out at any time and marvelling at the design, cover art, illustrations – and even text.
I’m way too eclectic but try to concentrate on illustrated books, fine printing, books on books, and certain artists. Can’t afford the paintings but have access to beautiful printed reproductions of favourites like Kurelek, Bieler, Morrice, Cezanne and Chagall. And of course, Emily Carr. Currently she is my hot topic trying to obtains as many books by her, about her, and any book that produces one of her paintings. And that’s where another part of book collecting is so much fun - research.
Parker loves to mix memorabilia with his books. He is a collector and curator.
I’ve just finished A Y Jackson’s autobiography; a good read but it was bought to find out what he thought of Carr when he met her.
Many books in my collection are by favourite illustrators. Count in Quentin Blake – who worked on many of the Roald Dahl books – Ardizzone, Sendak and Edward Gorey. Finding books in unlikely places they illustrated or perhaps only did the dust jackets for is fun as well as spending time in researching for titles.
Some are expensive but I’m interested in the art so condition isn’t super important. Although, of course a perfect, signed copy of Rockwell Kent’s Greenland Journal is a plus.
Books are organized by illustrators, titles such as Pinocchio, Wind in the Willows illustrated by a variety of artists, and books on publishers, printers, designers, and other collectors.
Rarest book is probably an edition of Shadow River, poems of Pauline Johnson that was limited to 40 copies – mine is #14 – that was designed, typeset, illustrated, printed and bound by the late Vancouver typographic genius Jim Rimmer.
Although my Book of Common Prayer inscribed to Penelope Thomas on December 13, 1768 is a joy to handle. And G K Chesterton has one of the nicest signatures found in my copy of a limited edition of his Collected Poems published in 1927.
Parker’s 1768 Prayer Book
Fun story is finding a small book inscribed to the Archbishop of Canterbury by Field Marshall Montgomery’s father Humphrey who was Bishop of Tasmania. How did it get to Calgary; I can only assume that as he left the palace the archbishop suggested it be put in the cathedral’s rummage sale.
I’m fortunate in having been hanging around Aquila Books - a Calgary shop that has a world reputation for fine books - every Saturday morning for more than 20 years and get to handle treasures like a first edition Christmas Carol, a medieval monastic book of chants, and a true first of Anne of Green Gables signed and with a dust jacket.
Parker’s Travel Book Recommendations:
Parker highly recommends this funny and informative book by one of the UK’s finest current writers who travels his birth country looking for the perfect dram of single malt.
Bought for the Paul Hogarth illustrations but the Irish playwright and storyteller takes you on an of interesting tour through the exciting city; and meetings with characters like Allen Ginsberg, Arthur Miller and James Baldwin.
Rockwell Kent’s diary and sketchbook of his journey to Greenland in 1931
Aritha van Herk wrote:
Books are my life, my lifeline, my livelihood. I am happiest surrounded by them, and I have a massive collection of books, especially Canadian fiction. But, I do not play favourites with my books.
I organize my book alphabetically by author in the Canadian sections, but by subject in my non-fiction books.
My rarest book is probably a signed copy of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children (to me), but it is a cheap paperback.
In fact, my books are not collector's items but the tools of my trade, objects to work with, and many of my books are falling apart from being read and re-read.
The strangest place I bought a book was in a bar in Cody, Wyoming.
My book-buying is not about collecting, but about reading. What do I want to read? Right at that moment. How does it intrigue me, call to me. Did I buy that book in Venice because of its glorious end-papers or its depiction of Trieste? Who knows?
No one book has impacted my life. Sometimes I toss them away after forty pages, realizing that they cannot command my attention any longer. Sometimes I fall into them and do not emerge for a day.
Time is the enemy of readers, and so we tend to ignore it.
LAST WoRD
I loved reading these stories about home libraries, books and sharing and the how reading a uniquely human behaviour influence our lives. Perhaps never more than now with the impact of COVID19 on our lives.
I never realized people share books so much and I was surprised at how much some people read and that they keep track of everything they have read. My best year was when I turned 50, I read 50 books and did a short synopsis of each to them, but I can’t imagine doing that every year. Perhaps if I didn’t play golf!
If you like this blog you will like these links:
Calgary Hidden Gem: The Book Dissected
Little Free Library Fun