Memberstellarexplorer

About My Library

Your Library here includes only books I own, with a small exception listed below.* I find the cataloging functions of LT primarily useful to me for managing and working with my actual library, and to connect me to others with similar books and interests. I do not see any use in tracking whether I have read or am reading a book. I do find it useful to track which of my books are top priorities for future reading (TBR). I have no category for books read but not owned, nor do I maintain wishlists on the site.

My Connections are generated from most of my library, minus science fiction and fiction, as these books were skewing MWYB too much.

*I have included in my library a small number of books I have read as audio books in the car from the library. There are also a handful tagged as "unowned", usually books I've borrowed, read, and returned

My interests as they relate to books:

I love books, love learning, love scholarship. I have a deep and abiding curiosity about the universe and about the miracle of our existence in it. I love impossible questions like “Why is there something rather than nothing?” I am deeply grateful for the capacity for awe and wonder.

What do I like to read? Fiction and nonfiction. Poetry and drama. I cut my teeth on science fiction and classics, but I have always read voraciously and widely.

I am obsessed with history in general, but am a hungry consumer of science, history of science, physics and biology in particular, psychology, geology, anthropology, human evolution, paleobiology, cosmology, biography. I love art and I love the creative process, mine and that of other people! I have never yet known more than momentary boredom.

Somehow, all of the above is reflected in my library.

About Me

Link to my most recent YouTube video:
https://youtu.be/Vw6umbhqsCg

My Reading Thread

Earliest piece of moral instruction recalled: "Books are our friends!"

Earliest memories of deep emotional attachment to books:
1) Crying inconsolably at "The Ugly Duckling", age 3
2) A beloved painting of early childhood-- a triptych-- from the old Leary's Book Store in Philadelphia. It featured a young boy in pajamas, carrying a candle, circa 1850. First panel has him creeping downstairs in the dark of night. The second has him huddled over a precious tome. In the third, he sneaks back upstairs before he can be caught.

If anyone can identify this painting, kindly let me know. I've been looking for a long time!

UPDATE: Triptych found, and now serves as my profile picture above


Cherished attitude about one's library as expressed in fiction:
"My books stand as guarantors of an extended life -- a life that is far more interesting and meaningful than the one I am forced to lead daily." -- roughly recalled from memory of Saul Bellow's Dangling Man

Feelings about the Tag Cloud: A 21st century snapshot of one's mind and one's interests. Complements traditional modes of self-definition.





Authors Good Enough to Place Among My Least Favorite Authors: Iain M Banks, Cormac McCarthy, Don Delillo

Location

On the outskirts of NYC

Local Favorites

Bookstores: Bruised Apple Books and Music, Metropolitan Museum of Art Shop, Strand Bookstore, Village Bookstore, Westsider Used and Rare Books

Libraries: Briarcliff Manor Public Library, Chappaqua Library

Member Connections

Friends

Aelith, AjaJin, AMZoltai, arethusarose, ashleybessbrown, AsYouKnow_Bob, bunwat, Busifer, Carmen808, clamairy, CyanDag, dgr2, Garp83, HRHSpence, jamlos.onedroid, kokipy, LibraryPerilous, LizzieD, Matkil360, meersan, michaelg16, MisfitKotLD, moiraji, MtnSk8tr, Nicole_VanK, nirvanian, pmackey, Polaris-, reading_fox, skarrin, Surtac, theoldman, ThePam, Theta9, tros, tuuli, Vetch, Wendy_Curtis

Interesting Library

albanyhill, ashleybessbrown, barriesegall, brewbooks, cdogzilla, CindyBytes, copyedit52, Feicht, Garp83, gintautas, gregfromgilbert, Hpriley3, JerryMonaco, LolaWalser, LSDMTMA, Nulla, pomonomo2003, rebeccanyc, rybie2, spacedoc, TerenceKempMcKenna, usnmm2, yeschaton

Contacts

gypsysmom