Thursday, October 06, 2005

"Skip to the final chapter of the book"

I wrote this post a long time ago and didn't publish it, but Swiss Toni's pictures of his books reminded me of it. So I added some pictures. I will say that my collection pales in contrast to ST's, and my CD collection is so pitiful, that it would not allow it's picture to be taken.

My family was always reading. I asked my father when I was 4 if he would teach me to read. He took me out and we bought the book Big Dog, Little Dog. Then he taught me how to read that book. We would often take our books to restaurants - oh, the joys of communication! The library and bookstore were my favorite places. I used to love the smell of the university library stacks, with all it's old books. Books have been my great escape.

I'm not a hoarder, so if I read a fiction book, especially those romances, it's mostly going to be resold or passed on. But I do keep many of my non-fiction books. I have 4 bookshelves in my apartment and they are mostly full...or would be if I put all my books away.



In my bedroom, the bookshelf holds a number of partially filled journals (I have a spotty history with journal writing...I'll start one, then move on to another without finishing the first), my collection of Octavia Butler novels, a selection of science fiction and lesbian fiction, gender and queer theory books and some erotica.



In the living room, the freestanding bookshelf has my poetry, feminist and women's issues books, political, spiritual, travel books, history and the hodgepodge of unread books - both fiction and non.

The built-in bookshelf, which I did not picture because...well, it's just a disorganized mess (yes, worse than the previous one and a little embarressing) has my professional books and books on witchcraft and paganism. Strangely appropriate that they are together since I use the word "practice" when talking about both.



But, perhaps, the most special bookshelf of all is the one in my kitchen. It is, of course, dedicated to cookbooks. I love cookbooks. I love reading cookbooks, mostly because I love to cook (especially when I can convince someone else to clean up...hard to do when I live alone). Most of them are vegetarian...except for 2 - a cookbook put together by my family and one put together to commemorate the 25th Anniversary of the Lutheran Volunteer Corps.

Of all my books, my favorite is Octavia Butler's Imago. My best used books are the poetry. The hardest book that I'm glad I read is the biography of Katherine Graham. The quirkiest and most Spinsterwitch is Pope Joan. And my favorite cookbook is 1000 Vegetarian Recipes.

8 comments:

Fred said...

Do you live in the back of a book store? :) Wow!

swisslet said...

I know the ordered nature of my CD collection probably indicates otherwise, but I love a jumble of books - as illustrated by the second photo here, and presumably by the one you didn't take a photo of. There's something so appealing about a massive pile of books waiting to be read - brilliant. And I totally agree with you about the smell of old books. Not musty ones, just the smell of books. mmmm.

There's more to life than books you know, but not much more.

ST

Aravis said...

I have a great love of books as well. Spending a day in a book store, especially a used bookstore with piles to sort through, is ideal. I chuckled when I saw the second photo. It looks an awful lot like a bookcase I'm sitting next to now. Then there's my desk's many shelves and the overflow onto the cupboard next to me... I can so relate to your photos and descriptions! *LOL*

my word today is: wootfyw

Flash said...

Maybe I'm just a blithering philistine, but "queer theory" books? You don't have to do a two-part test like for driving do you?

red one said...

The cookbook compiled by your family sounds interesting. What goodies are tucked away in there?

red

HistoryGeek said...

Fox - I should sometime do a post on that...

Flash - hee, hee...well, actually you just have to have the test before you can recruit anyone...Seriously, though, there are university courses on GLBT studies (I hate the term GLBT, by the way...It's too damn awkward, but others are quite pleased with the acronym). Most of the books I have are about social and historical stuff about bisexuality.

HistoryGeek said...

Red - lot's of good sweets. I'm sure theirs a jem of a Jello salad in there, and some random other very midwestern, bland food. Really the desserts are the best of my cultural/food heritage, in my opinion.

HistoryGeek said...

What happened to that there's morphing into a "theirs" in that post? ACK!