unread books

Interesting to read LIW on unread books:

Sherlock Holmes bought many books, but read few of them. He stored the books in stacks on his floor. I do no think that is a pleasant way to live. I prefer a state where I have read all the books in my home. In other words, I want to be Nero Wolfe, not Sherlock Holmes.

Most of the physical books in my house are books that I've read. There are perhaps two or three somewhere in my bookshelves that I've not read. It's nice to have lots of old favorites, sometimes a well known book can be a comfort. Sometimes I remmeber I've read the book, but most of the plot points and characters seem new to me on a rereading. Though this seems to be a rarer occurance now.

On the other hand, I've been condsidering getting rid of prhaps 50% of my books -- those books that I have read once or twice, and doubt I will want to read again in the next 5 or 10 years. I prefer that most of the books I read are new to me, and I have a collection of perhaps 30 unread ebooks.

The importance of having something fresh to read was borne out when a power failure made these ebooks unavailable, and I ended up rummaging through several other people's bookcases for something new to read after growing bored with my own collection of books.

The nice thing about e-books of course is that they can sit in a directory somewhere and piles of unread ones don't lean threateningly off of tables.

Reading: Mischner on Alaska, page 800-ish of 1000+, week 2.