The Lost Books

            Hello there, reader. Tonight I’m here to talk about something that I think is probably a fairly universal experience among readers: the unspoken reproach of the unread book. Surely you know what I’m talking about—one of the great joys of a reading life is visiting bookstores, walking out there among the shelves… although these days bookstores are becoming increasingly rare, which I for one very much regret. It’s the Luddite in me, I’m sure. But there’s just something about the presence, the physicality of a printed book that no e-reader can give you. Of course, the e-reader saves you plenty of space on shelves, saves you the awful trouble of having gorgeous row upon row of volumes lining your walls. It saves you from the delicious task of intermittently dusting the shelves, of leafing idly through a few books that happen to pique your interest as you go about your happy work. It saves you the inexplicably enjoyable diversion of thinking up new ways to arrange and rearrange your books on the shelves… should it be alphabetical by author this time? Or maybe by title? Or should we go some more esoteric route, try arranging the books by the thickness of the spine, or height, or color? But best of all, surely, the e-reader saves us the lovely game of hide-and-seek that comes when we lend a book to a friend, wondering with a grin whether we’ll get it back, and what condition it might be in when that happens. Maybe it’s better to go electronic, after all.

Even Dante was one to get lost in bookstores, from time to time.

            But to walk up and down and around the shelves of a bookstore… you never know what you might find! You walk around, admiring the spines as they stare out imploringly from the shelves, and you pick one up. You’re not sure why you pick this particular one up… maybe it’s got an interesting title, maybe a friend recommended it and you think it’s about time to look into it—since they wouldn’t lend it to you! Maybe you’re familiar with some of the author’s other work and are curious to read more, maybe it’s got an unusual color or typeface. More often than not, before we can judge books by their covers, we have to judge them by their spines.

I think we too often downplay the sensuous enjoyment of the book as a physical object. There’s the feel of the paper, from the delicate crinkling of thin leaves to the healthy resistance of smooth, thick sheets. There’s the enjoyment of the typeface itself, the overreaching serifs & twirling curlicues, intimidating bolds and accommodating italics. There’s the feeling of gradually passing the pages of the book from the right hand to the left during the process of reading, allowing you to imagine yourself as a slow-motion card shark shuffling the deck. There’s the lithe floral grace of a slim volume and the reassuring weight of a hefty tome. But above all, there’s the smell of a new book—sometimes there seem to be cinnamon notes, sometimes dusty solemnity, some incense-sweet and some blank, desert-pure.

Almost enough to make life start making sense, isn't it?

            But it always happens, never ever fails: you get home from the bookstore, two or three new novels in tow… and there they are, staring at you, all the books on your shelves that you still haven’t got around to reading. You swear you can almost hear them sighing, whispering to one another.

One says, “Here he comes… only three new ones this time, thank God for small blessings.”

Another: “Sometimes I have nightmares… I’m sitting on this shelf forever, unread, unused, dust piled on me so I look like I’ve got a powdered wig. I sit here so long that my ink falls out and my glue unsticks from my spine. And then a fire. Fire without water, and I don’t even have the letters in me to scream. I burn and burn without a name.”

Or this one, in a quavering voice: “I’m really gonna do it this time. I’m gonna jump. Straight into the recycling bin! What’s the worst that could happen? Even if I come back as a newspaper, it would be better than this.”

It’s a bittersweet sort of melancholy, this feeling we have for the books we haven’t read. We tell ourselves stories sometimes, we tell ourselves that we’re going to read five books before we allow ourselves to buy one. That way, give it a year or two or three and we’ll have read all our books and we won’t have to worry about The Bell Jar over there going and doing itself in. But then—it never fails—we see a “Buy two get one free” sale, or we find a copy of some book we’ve been hunting down for years… and wouldn’t you know it, it’s a hardcover on a bargain deal, three bucks—how could I live with myself if I passed that up? So our great pithy enterprise turns awry, and we hear the books muttering at us from their color-organized shelves. We’ll get around to all of them at some time or another, won’t we? Let’s hope so.

Well, you have a wonderful day, reader. Oh, and you know that book you’ve been telling me about? You wouldn’t mind lending me that, would you? Thanks, reader, I’ll get to this one soon… I think I’ve only got five books ahead of it on my list. I’ll have it back to you before you know it.