LOA Zero

Just posted on the Folio Society Group but this is likewise relevant for my LOA books...

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I can't exactly recall on what thread I heard the term, but I noticed someone mention Folio Zero and I immediately thought now that's what I need to do!

There has always been an array of opinions on why folk buy Folio Society editions, with some just buying for the pure look of the book, and others buy to read nice volumes.

I probably have been a centralist in that spectrum, buying for the look and the book equally.

But over the years, I have accumulated hundreds of Folio Society books and have reached the stage where they have become a growing collection of ornaments to furnish my library.

I'm simply not reading enough of them. I could say the same for my Library of America collection but that's for another group.

Anyway, I'm intrigued to discover if anyone shares my sentiments and have considered that their burgeoning collection will never get read!? :-)

Perhaps this is something I might start on, dedicating more reading time towards the books that have cost me an arm and leg to obtain.

Has anyone tried this, and or considered reading their whole collection?

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What about you and your LOA books?

Consider Umberto Eco's wise words about the value of unread books in one's personal library:

"The writer Umberto Eco belongs to that small class of scholars who are encyclopedic, insightful, and nondull. He is the owner of a large personal library (containing thirty thousand books), and separates visitors into two categories: those who react with “Wow! Signore professore dottore Eco, what a library you have! How many of these books have you read?” and the others — a very small minority — who get the point that a private library is not an ego-boosting appendage but a research tool. Read books are far less valuable than unread ones. The library should contain as much of what you do not know as your financial means, mortgage rates, and the currently tight real-estate market allows you to put there. You will accumulate more knowledge and more books as you grow older, and the growing number of unread books on the shelves will look at you menacingly. Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books. Let us call this collection of unread books an antilibrary."

>2 euphorb:

Thanks, nice way to think about it. And I have also responded to the same questions with... 'Well that's not the point, and many of these are reference volumes."

But specifically in regard to my LOA collection, I really do have to start reading more of the buggers! :-)

I like Eco's sensibility even as I respectfully decline the idea that "read books are far less valuable than unread ones".

That aside, I realised early on that i could easily get lost if I didn't have a clear set of constraints guiding what I purchased from Folio and LOA. I have to both like the design and the content, and more than that, expect to read the book at least twice or I shouldn't purchase it. I've strayed a couple times, but that approach has served me well. (I've also cut down on purchases and strive to read more of those books I have.)

I used to buy complete sets of books - Great Books of the Western World, Harvard Classics, Franklin Library Mysteries, a complete Shakespeare set, etc. - knowing full well that I would never read them all, but also knowing that I could pick up an essay by John Locke or an Aristophanes comedy or an Agatha Christie story whenever I had the interest to do so. I still have those sets and still read in them frequently, so I understand Eco’s statement about the value of unread books. I also own almost all of the LOA volumes for the same reason. However, I no longer buy single books unless I expect to read them right away.

For LOA, I definitely read some of each volume I buy. I find I get obsessed with completing author sets in LOA format, even if I have most of the novels in a volume in single volumes from other publishers. That being said, my FS obsession is way bigger than my LOA obsession.

"Many years ago," Gaspar said. taking out a copy of Moravia's THE ADOLESCENTS and thumbing it as he spoke, "I had a library full of books, oh thousands of books -- never could bear to toss one out, not even the bad ones ,-- and when folks would come to the house to visit they'd look around at all the nooks and crannies stuffed with books; and if they were the sort of folks who don't snuggle with books, they'd always ask the same dumb question." He waited a moment for a response and when none was forthcoming (the sound of china cups on sink tile), he said, "Guess what the question was."

From the kitchen, without much interest, "No idea."

"They'd always ask it with the kind of voice people use in the presence of large sculptures in museums. They'd ask me, 'Have you read all these books?' He waited again, but Billy Kinetta was not playing the game. "Well, young fella, after a while, the same dumb question gets asked a million times, you get sorta snappish about it. And it came to annoy me more than a little bit. 'Till I finally figured out the right answer.

"And you know what that answer was? Go ahead, take a guess."

Billy appeared in the kitchenette doorway. "I suppose you told them that you read a lot of them but not all of them."

Gaspar waved the guess away with a flapping hand. "Now what good would that have done? They wouldn't have known they'd asked a dumb question, but I didn't want to insult them, either. So when they'd ask if I read all those books, I'd say, 'Hell, no. Who wants a library full of books you've already read?'"

--- from, "Paladin of the Lost Hour" by Harlan Ellison (copyright 1985)

>7 Truett:

That's a great contribution to this thread, and it's another bit of evidence that I need to read some Ellison. We've been speculating in another LOA thread that he might be getting the LOA treatment eventually, whether short stories or novels. Probably I shouldn't wait until LOA clarifies the situation.

I never buy books that I don't intent to eventually read in their entirety. That includes sets like Britannica's Great Books of the Western World, though I may make an exception for the Euclid volume. (I did geography in school long ago.) Sometimes books sit on my shelves for quite a while before I get around to them. For example it took decades before I finally read Ovid's Metamorphosis and Boccaccio's Decameron just this past summer. I instantly regretted waiting so long; there is a reason that they're remained in print so long. Except for areas of special interest, impulse often determines when I read a book, though I tend to give priority to books I've most recently acquired. Roughly ten years ago, I started keeping track of how many books I was reading annually versus new books I was acquiring. I have a goal to eventually read all of the books in my possession, and I realized (duh!) that I had to be reading more than I was acquiring if that was to happen. It has helped me to make progress, partly by making me more judgmental about which new books to buy.

LOA books get special attention. I have all of the main series volumes, all of the American Poets Project volumes, and most of the special publications. At one point I was getting quite a bit behind before starting an approximately 50 page a day reading regimen for LOA's main series. I caught up two years ago and have stayed current since then. It helps that some of the volumes are relatively quick reads. For example, I couldn't put down the first of the Elmore Leonard volumes and blew through it in four days. Poetry usually slows me down. I usually have two or three other books that I read in parallel at varying paces.

A question I was asked by someone staring disbelievingly at my crowded bookshelves was, "Why would you want to keep a book that you've already read?" This was from someone whose career has required him to move every few years, and to cope, he and his wife have pared down their possessions to the minimum essentials. Part of my answer is that it isn't uncommon for me to go to a book more than once. Sometimes after reading a story or a novel, I will reread it to my wife. Sometimes family members will borrow a book on a recommendation of mine. Occasionally, I will treat books I've read as references. That is especially common for books like The Debate on the Constitution, Lincoln, Franklin, Slave Narratives, American Earth, etc. It is hard for me to predict which books I may want to go back to. Besides, seeing books that I've read often reminds me of the pleasure I had when I read them. Running down lists of e-books I've read just isn't the same.

From >7 Truett:: 'Hell, no. Who wants a library full of books you've already read?'"

Answer: My library isn't "totally" full of books I've already read--there are a couple hundred that I haven't gotten around to yet--but I find that books I've already read do have value; at least to me.

I do weed out books occasionally. Early last year, my son and I donated seven densely packed boxes of books to our local Friends of the Library organization. If you know where to look on my shelves, there are subtle signs of their absence.

>7 Truett:

Lovely.

>9 Podras.: At one point I was getting quite a bit behind before starting an approximately 50 page a day reading regimen for LOA's main series.

That's a nice strategy: hadn't thought of that.

Les Miserables: Yes, it is -- courtesy of the writing talents of Harlan Ellison, of course (I ALWAYS think of that passage when people ask that silly question about MY rather small -- 4000 or 5000 or so -- library).

Elenchus: I've definitely been following -- and contributing -- to that discussion (whether or not Ellison will be given the LOA treatment). And I DEFINITELY believe that his short stories and essays should be gathered. NOT the three or four novels from early in his career (they are fine, solid pieces of craftsmanship, but they are from a time before his writing genius truly took root -- around the time he wrote "Daniel White For the Greater Good", I believe). If anything beyond his best short stories and essays were to be collected, it would have to be a few of his teleplays, and the unpublished screenplay, "I, Robot", based on Asimov's writings.

Podras: If you are moved to answer the rhetorical question -- "Who wants a library full of books you've already read?" -- you've completely missed the whimsy behind it all. :) Ellison DID say that he discovered whimsy is not as common (or identifiable) as he used to think, especially after he wrote (and shared/published) the short story, "Goodbye to All That", which has a terrific denouement, and an even better last scene (topped off -- pun intended -- with a killer, whimsical, line).

Harlan, as do I, had a library FILLED with books he constantly reread.
There are some titles -- and, indeed, some authors -- whose prose sings every time one embraces it, revivifying both mind and spirit. That sort of magic is priceless. It's one of the reasons we readers count books among our most prized possessions.

>11 Truett: Whimsy can be a legitimate starting point for a discussion, too. ;-)