Today’s Booking Through Thursday question is: Books as collectibles:
• Hardcover? Or paperback?
• Illustrations? Or just text?
• First editions? Or you don’t care?
• Signed by the author? Or not?
I don’t collect books, I never have. When I buy books, I buy them to read. Sure, they look nice sitting on the shelf — they may even add to my happiness by sitting on the shelf if I liked them enough to consider rereading them — but I view books as a vehicle for story much more than I view them as collectible objects.
I rarely own a full series; over time, it’s actually been much more likely that I would own the end of a series. I’d start reading the series from the library or elsewhere, but then they didn’t have the rest of the books in said series. Even when I do own an entire series, they’re often not matching editions.
Having good copies of old books is fun. Having books signed by the author is fun. But I live in a small town — there aren’t many author signings available to me. And while these things may be fun, they aren’t why I buy books. Even some of my favorite books of all time I don’t own; this I think about changing.
4 comments
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February 26, 2009 at 9:06 am
bermudaonion
I live in a medium sized city that is wedged between 2 large cities. Authors will go from one large city to the other and snub our medium sized city. I just don’t get it. It seems like they’d stop here to take a little break and sign a couple books.
February 26, 2009 at 9:14 am
gautami tripathy
I have cut down on my buying. I only buy books I wish to keep.
My BTT post
February 26, 2009 at 10:40 am
Megan
I buy books just to read, too — with only a few exceptions! When I have a book signed by an author, I usually buy a second copy of it to actually read and loan out to friends/family. I never want anyone messing with my signed books!
My favorites, anyway!
February 26, 2009 at 3:57 pm
claire
I like to collect favourites, not everything I read. I do use the library a lot.