Books; reading, collecting and the physical housing of them has brought the book-lover joy - and stress - for centuries. Fascinated writers have tried to capture the particular relationships we form with our library, and the desperate troubles we will undergo to preserve it.
With Alex Johnson as your guide, immerse yourself in this eclectic anthology and hear from an iconic Prime Minister musing over the best way to store your books and an illustrious US President explaining the best works to read outdoors. Enjoy serious speculations on the psychological implications of reading from a 19th century philosopher, and less serious ones concerning the predicament of dispensing with unwanted volumes or the danger of letting children (the `enemies of books') near your collection.
The many facets of book-mania are pondered and celebrated with both sincerity and irreverence in this lively selection of essays, poems, lectures and commentaries ranging from the 16th to the 20th century.
The Enemies of Books by William Blades (1881)
Unpacking my library by Walter Benjamin (1931)
A Lesson in Fiction by Stephen Leacock (1910)
Detached Thoughts on Books and Reading by Charles Lamb (1822)
Books for Holidays in the Open by Theodore Roosevelt (1916)
Bibliomania by John Ferriar (1809)
The Uses of Reading by Rudyard Kipling (1912)
On Reading and Books by Arthur Schopenhauer (1851)
On books and the housing of them by W.E. Gladstone (1890)
Of Studies by Francis Bacon (1601)
On Destroying Books (1919)
