Monthly Archives: March 2010
Buying books
It can be very stressing on my bank account when I browse through an internet bookstore. Just two days ago I ordered for about 100 € worth of cheap books. And any day now they will be filing through my physical mailbox, giving the mailman a run for his money. We are almost on a first name basis, since I see him twice a week these days. I like the postal service, it’s a great invention when it works which, around these parts, is 98 percent of the time, so let’s hear it for the men and women in red!! I just can’t seem to stop buying books. Classics, literary theory, culture, encyclopedia’s, compilations et cetera. Is it a compulsive disorder when it’s useful, practical, enlightening?
Today the mailman brought me The Complete Novels of Jane Austen (yey for Austen, not so yey for the cheesy cover picturing Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen, yikes, at least give me classic Mr. Darcy if you please!).
The Complete Novels of Jane Austen
Last week it was Alcott’s Little Women, Stoker’s Dracula, Solanas’ SCUM Manifesto and a compilation of international stories, Because I Am A Girl (for my niece, who is obsessing over the vampire craze that has turned every teenage girl into a self-denying servant of the dark side, all the while exploring the magnitude that is female sexuality, in a very weird bifurcated manner). Anyhoo, books, lot’s of them. I am expecting the massive amount I bought a couple of days ago to be here no later than the end of this week, jippey.
Because I am a Girl, Dracula, SCUM Manifesto, Little Women
The only problem is I don’t have time to read them (which is awkward, when people stare and ask about books in my bookshelf).
A day at the library
I did it. I finally hauled my backside off the nice armchair, away from my cozy little den I call home, defied all common sense and biked 10 km down to my university library.
I love the library and I don’t mean the casual “uh, I love taco’s”-statement or “I loved the game yesterday”, I mean over-the-moon-smittened-butterflies-in-stomach kind of love. The first thing I do when I move to a new place is finding out where the library is. I like to browse through the bookshelves, touch the covers, read the back, keeping an open mind. I like the silence, the joint agreement of a group of strangers passing each other by the shelves, a nod here, a smile there. The smell of books, ah, there is nothing like it in the world.
My library doesn’t smell quite like a library should though. The architects, I guessed, found the cramped, shabby, dark atmosphere too uninspiring, so they opted for at glass facade, light colors, and in my personal opinion, very few bookshelves. Everything is open, not a nook in sight.
But somehow that’s ok, because my university library is not really a library in the old sense of the word for me. This library is for when I need a place to read (read: own material, away from home, because somehow I never get to the studying part there), to write on my exam projects, or if I need to be in the presence of other people. The only downside to it is that because it is so open and light (my theory, no stats behind this claim) people tend to use it as a place for study groups, and the practice of not using phones or talking out loud in the library has changed to taking a call on the stairs and laughing about a youtube clip or the latest reality show on TV. But it’s not loud all the time, and those moments are worth the silent teeth grinding ones 🙂
My town library on the other hand is an old school, except when, between 10 am to 2 pm, it is turned into a school library. But even those kids are more quiet than what can be expected here. It’s a small two-storey library with nooks and silence. It smells of, and is filled with… you guessed it; books.
I love the library. When I grow up I want the biggest room in my house/flat/cardboard box to be filled, jammed, crammed with books.
Books
This post is dedicated to the wonderful world of literature.
Ever since I was a little girl books have been my go-to’s, my escape, my friends, basically a retreat from the world. It wasn’t a compensation but a passion that filled my days. Cooped up in my little pubescent ivory tower, I could think of nothing better than to sink into a world of excitement, a world where fantastical, thrilling and horrible things happened, with emphasis on the happening part. Partly because I come from a Dullsville type of town, where the most rallied people get is at the local football match, I never really felt at ease with the place and many of its people.
So I read. A lot. All the time. When I wasn’t watching TV. I read about Biko and learnt about a country called South Africa and the term ‘Apartheid’, I jumped in the hole with Alice In Wonderland, went on adventures with Robinson Crusoe and Jules Verne, and personalized WWII in Anne Frank, while I swallowed Nordic literature from one language to another. I was lucky to have a mother whose bookshelf was amazing – stocked with all sorts of books – so when one book was done with off I went down the stairs and picked another one. My favorite time in public school was, surprise surprise, when we got to go to the school library.
All grown up, I have discovered that my passion is not a solitary one. I used to think that I could not get more isolated from people and society than when I was wrapped up in a book, and you still will have a hell of a time trying to get in contact with me when I am reading (mission impossible). But where I once was used to keeping my opinions to myself after the closing lines of a novel, I now find myself in the midst of a bustling scene, where books have an impact on society. They arouse thought and feeling, and one key element; they can play an immensely important role when it comes to discussion and debate. My life has been filled with books, and constantly I learn about different shades of life through them.
So this is my way of paying back for the great gifts I have received in the world of books.
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