For a number of weeks I've been toying with the idea of buying no books whatsoever in 2016 and to read only from my own library. I am saying 'toying with the idea' here but it was more like a very fleeting thought that first came and went while I was browsing the SALE bin in Foyles. Then it surfaced again when, looking for a set of pencils, I came across a number of boxes in the guest bedroom [whaaaaat?! I moved 8 months ago! How can these still be here?!], two of which contain books from the house in Cheshire I forgot I had [but was very thrilled to see again, The Polar Express amongst them, as well as the Tutankhamen book of the exhibition from a few years back].
But there it was again, that passing suggestion to myself that, hey, you've got tons of wonderful books you've yet to read right here at home. Allow me to tell you at this point that I did not feel bad about it at all; when one buys books at the rate I do [350+ over the past three years alone], one isn't really doing so in order to rush home to crack a new pristine spine by the fireplace, but because the Building of The Perfect Library is a lifelong commitment. And yet, having moved twice in 26 months, the silent brown boxes stacked in many corners have been a very stern reminder that I've got plenty at home, I needn't buy anything else, for a while at least.
Even so, discussing it with friends and family brought me to the conclusion that abstaining from buying books for a year is about as likely to happen as losing two stones. In fact, I'll tell you what, I'd stand a far greater chance to do that if only I signed up at Equinox with their excruciating 200 quid per month rate [and that's after you've also paid a {currently discounted} initiation fee of 150 quid]. So I laughed at the idea until yesterday afternoon when I braved the lashings of rain for a quick trip to my local art store, Green and Stone, the legendary Chelsea supplier of all wonderful things. I went for a sheet of paper but as I ambled around the shelves, I spotted a wonderful book by one of my favourite authors, Pete Scully. Here's the offending item:
Looked hot off the press, nice and thick, smelt fine, felt great in my hands. I gave it a perfunctory flick-through and secured it under my arm while I kept on browsing. Half an hour later, I sit down in the local Nero with a steaming cup and my spanking new book. Now dear reader, imagine my dismay when I started going through the contents properly and recognised a couple of drawings. It took no time to confirm that, indeed, I already have this book. At that point, I did experience a slight pang of resentment; if I already have this book, why on earth...? But even then, I trailed off. When I got back home, it took me a good hour to locate the copy I already own because, regardless of a study whose walls are now covered in books, and a kitchen with seven shelves to the ceiling, and a couple of additional boxes in some other room... there is always an overspill by my bed. Specifically, this one was underneath the bed, with a summer copy of Vanity Fair for company [but it was the Vanity Fair with Channing Tatum so, good company for the book I'd say].
Today I sheepishly returned to the study because, while I am telling you that the walls are covered in books, it's only a part disclosure. I don't yet have a system like I did at the old house. With the exception of the Agatha Christie volumes [all of them, I am proud to tell you], and the vampire books, and the Wodehouse ones [not all of them, I am sad to say], the rest of them are merely plonked on the shelves with no head nor tail, as they came out of the boxes. I cracked on for a couple of hours and I've now tidied up the children's books, which look rather splendid next to me as I type, the books about creativity, and the DVDs. As I was doing so though, I came across another stack of very special items: journals, notebooks and pads. Suffice to say, I think I could open a stationery store. I came across stacks of pristine Moleskines [you name it, I have it, London limited edition, National Gallery pocket edition, Omega white edition, two of them, watercolour, small and large, Peanuts...etc...], some still shrink-wrapped, as well as an ample selection of fine, and extra-fine, notebooks with soft, pliable covers, Smythson notebooks, perpetual diaries, Korean ones, Japanese ones and I'll stop right here.
So perhaps I should buy nothing of this sort this year, there's plenty here. In fact, if I lump together the books, the notebooks, the art supplies, the DVDs, the video games, and the board games I could quite easily survive the world being overtaken by vampires [in the style of I Am Legend] while outliving the last one of them, and even then, I'd probably still only get found leafing to the last page of Moby Dick [which I bought today by the way]. Susan Hill already had such an epiphany years back, something that brought her to read from her own library for a year, and then chronicling the exploit in Howard's End is on The Landing. Still, when all of this is said and done, I am not at all confident I can display such restraint.
