Random books from yvonnemurakami's library

About meMy library is 250 miles from where I live and work. I get a chance to visit it perhaps once a month, for a day or two at most, but it's worth the journey to be able to sit among the books that are woven into the story of my life. It includes the first 'book' I ever read to the many of the best I have ever read, and a growing collection of those that I need to read. Many of them I had sold (in hard times) or given away, or lost in hurricanes, and only just recently begun to buy back.

I practice some restraint, and the space on the shelves in my library imposes its own discipline. But I catch myself wondering (often) whether my desire for a particular book justifies purchasing it. There are some which are now available online - such as CEW Bean's 12 volume History of the Australian Imperial Forces in WWI - which would be well over $2000 to buy. I had two sets - once upon a time. Buying a third set now just doesn't make sense. Aspley Cherry-Garrards 'Worst Journey in the World' is another book I have read many times, but it is in my father's library - along with hundreds of other's - and I can't justify having two copies in the family. And there's some - such as "To Long Tan" which I sold for a song and now can't afford to buy back.

So for now I'm looking at becoming a little more discriminating, filling in the gaps in my fiction collections (Iris Murdoch, Greene, Conrad, Donleavy, and Nabokov) and acquiring key philosophical and sociological books on ethics, morals and society (Malthus, Hume, Paine etc). The final discipline of course is to read everything I acquire (that I haven't read before).

Oh, and I am not Yvonne Murakami, but the library is named after her. She had the wisdom (in 1971) to remind me that my strong point was reading, not romancing, and she was right 'dozens of times over' between then and now. .

Locationalbany western australia

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Member sinceOct 25, 2009