Journal Entry 1 by Rutchmather from Rock Island, Illinois USA on Tuesday, April 20, 2004

Journal Entry 2 by cestmoi from Hamilton, Ontario Canada on Tuesday, June 01, 2004

Whoa a hefty book! Oh Gosh, didnt' realise I was at the beginning of the ring!! Will do my best to get it moving quickly! 

Journal Entry 3 by SalDragski from San Antonio, Texas USA on Saturday, July 10, 2004

Just received. Will read next. 

Journal Entry 4 by SalDragski from San Antonio, Texas USA on Friday, July 23, 2004

Just skimmed through the book. Mainly about different peoples libraries dating back to the 1700s to present. 

Journal Entry 5 by Zmrzlina from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA on Friday, August 13, 2004

What I want to know is how this madness can be gentle! Our madness, those of us who just can't get enough of anything connected to books and reading, is anything but gentle. It is demanding, fierce, expensive and a total joy. Can't wait to start reading it, so I am going to go neglect all the other rings and TBR and get started right away. 

Journal Entry 6 by Zmrzlina from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA on Friday, August 13, 2004

Journal Entry 7 by Zmrzlina from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA on Sunday, August 15, 2004

I've read only the introduction and prologue, but just had to make a post. This is a long book, so I think it warrants multiple posts.

Alongside this I am reading, The Book on the Bookshelf, which is perfect since it is about bookshelves. Really. And entire book about bookshelves. I am thoroughly enjoying it. There is one passage about books looking like Manhattan brownstones as they sit on the shelf, each with there only very small back and front yard. I love that image. And I love how this book just fits so nice with Basbanes'. Each passage about bibliophiles chasing another rare book makes me think about where that book will take up residence once found.

And another book sitting here beside me is Most Beautiful Libraries in the World, another member of my books about books collection. Now there is some incredibly gorgeous real estate!

But mostly what made me want to make a very early journal entry is Basbanes' initial discussion on collecting. I once took an entire university course about collecting. I didn't learn why people collect, but it did introduce me to an entire area of sociological study that could very well have become an all consuming passion if I had been better suited for independence at that stage of my life. And, of course, I have a book to recommend on the subject, too, To Have and To Hold.

Will post again when I've read much more. 

Journal Entry 8 by MaryZee from Taneytown, Maryland USA on Thursday, November 18, 2004

Just received today. I have one bookring to finish, and one more in front of it. I'll update here when I start on it - probably less than 2 weeks.

11/26 - Starting on this today. 

Journal Entry 9 by MaryZee from Taneytown, Maryland USA on Sunday, November 28, 2004

This is proving to be a very readable book, despite its massive size. I'm enjoying this very much, and am gradually working my way thru it.

Before BC, I never realized books-about-books was a genre in itself. I've enjoyed several other books of this type recently.
Biblioholism: The Literary Addiction
So Many Books, So Little Time: A Year of Passionate Reading
Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader

Since I'm enjoying this book so much, I thought I'd make note of some quotes from the book which are exceedingly appropriate to our lives as BookCrossers:
pp 21-22, regarding Thomas Jefferson Fitzpatrick, who collected books as an official "field collector" for the Iowa State Historical Society from 1903-1907, and continued to collect books thru the rest of his life. "In November 1950, the eighty-two-year-old bibliomane had a brush with the law when city officials cited him for violating local building codes in his house. The maximum permissible load limit for multilevel dwellings was forty pounds per square foot; an inspector had estimated that Fitzpatrick's house was supporting more than eight times that weight - about ninety tons altogether, most of it in books. The action was later dismissed on grounds that the collector's "rights of privacy" had been invaded...
On March 28, 1952, five days shy of his eighty-fourth birthday, Fitzpatrick died in his kitchen on an army cot that he used as a bed, "surrounded by a clutter of books and papers, nestled against a potbelly stove."...
"The house was full of books, packed with books, all thirteen rooms,...books were stacked under tables, piled up on beds, heaped in bundles on both sides of the stairways, pressed three and four deep in bookcases and onto ceiling-height shelving that lined every room and all hallways. Every room was awash with teetering piles of books, tied bundles of pamphlets, and stacks of magazines, so that we had to inch our way along trails hacked into a bookman's jungle."

We're not that bad, are we? :-)
 

Journal Entry 10 by MaryZee from Taneytown, Maryland USA on Sunday, November 28, 2004

Another quote from the book, which is fitting for BookCrossers -
pp 72-73, regarding Petrarch "...asked others to be on the lookout for manuscripts. 'Please, if you love me, find people who are educated and trustworthy and set them to scour Tuscany, to turn out the book-cases of the monks and all the other scholars, and see if anything comes to light which will serve to quench - or, shall I say, increase - my thirst,' he wrote a friend sometime around the year 1346."
"In the same letter, ... 'one insatiable desire which I so far have been unable to control.' That, of course, was books; then there was the frustration of 'the impossibility of getting enough' of them. 'Maybe I have more than I need,' he allowed, 'but it is the same with books as with everything else - success in finding them spurs one on to greed for more. There is moreover something special about books; gold and silver, jewels and purple raiment, marble halls and well-tended fields, pictures and horses in all their trappings, and everything else of that kind can afford only passing pleasure with nothing to say, whereas books can warm the heart with friendly words and counsel, entering into a close relationship with us which is articulate and alive.'"


And I believe Richard Heber, Esq. (1773-1833)had the heart of a BookCrosser as well (pp 110-111) -
"An affable man often praised for his kindness and generosity, Heber purportedly said that no gentleman 'can comfortably do without three copies of a book. One he must have for his show copy, and he will probably keep it at his country house. Another he will require for his own use and reference; and unless he is inclined to part with this, which is very inconvenient, or risk the injury of his best copy, he must needs have a third at the service of his friends.'" 

Journal Entry 11 by MaryZee from Taneytown, Maryland USA on Sunday, December 19, 2004

Finished this up this evening. Quite an enjoyable book, although reading it is quite a project due to the size. I found it went best if I read 100-200 pp. then found something else quick and lite to take a break for a few days. Then I could go back to the book with renewed interest.

Thanks for sharing this Rutchmather! I'm looking forward to the other books, too.

1/2 update - Mailing this to Mlbish, Monday, 1/3. 

Journal Entry 12 by mlbish from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA on Thursday, January 06, 2005

Thank you, MaryZee. I found this package tucked safely between the screen and front doors. Thanks for waiting to send it!

Wow, what a giant book. I'm looking forward to starting it and will keep it moving as soon as I'm finished. I have a bit of a holdup here as I am defending my PhD in a couple of weeks, but after that I will really fly! 

Journal Entry 13 by mlbish from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA on Monday, April 11, 2005

Well I have been chipping away at this tome for a LONG TIME! I loved its anecdotal style, and it was well-suited to being read in small increments, which is lucky because that's what my lifestyle has required in the last few weeks.

I am a lover of books. (Aren't we all?!?) I mean, though, that as much as I love reading, I just love books. I love their covers, the way they feel in my hands. I love the way they look all lined up on the shelves in my house or the library or the bookstore. This love of books certainly gets me in trouble sometimes (or more than sometimes!) but it also allowed me to greatly appreciate this book about books.

Thanks so much for sharing! I'm sorry you had to wait so long for me.

And Zmrzlina's right. Pittsburgh IS glorious!

I have TramGirl's address and I will post to Aus. shortly. 

Journal Entry 14 by mlbish at bookring in bookring, Bookring -- Controlled Releases on Tuesday, April 19, 2005

Released 7 yrs ago (4/19/2005 UTC) at bookring in bookring, Bookring -- Controlled Releases

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

RELEASE NOTES:

Posting to Australia. Happy trails! 

Journal Entry 15 by TramGirl from Ballarat, Victoria Australia on Tuesday, June 14, 2005

I totally forgot that I signed up for this book so it was a nice surprise to receive it in the mail yesterday! It is quite a big book so hopefully it won't take me too long to get through. 

Journal Entry 16 by TramGirl from Ballarat, Victoria Australia on Sunday, October 16, 2005

Just to let you all know that I still have the book and am slowly getting through it, it is so big that it lives beside my bed and I read it when I can...I think I'm going to have to start skimming it and then hopefully send it on soon! 

Journal Entry 17 by TramGirl from Ballarat, Victoria Australia on Wednesday, January 11, 2006

Ok, not quite done with the book yet but I'm about to go away for two weeks to the beach and this book is coming with me! Regardless of whether I finish it or not it will be posted upon my return in February because I've had it too long and feel bad that I've held things up so much.

Please don't hold it against me!! 

Journal Entry 18 by TramGirl from Ballarat, Victoria Australia on Tuesday, April 25, 2006

I have finally posted this book off!!! I'm soooo sorry that I had it for so long, it was just so big that it kept ending up under stuff, dropping to the bottom of the pile!

I didn't end up reading it cover to cover but I did skim it and read bits that interested me, there were a quite a few good stories that I enjoyed. Thanks Rutchmather for the opportunity to read this book.

I sent this off on 24/4/06 via sea mail (once again sorry but it meant postage was half the price!) so hopefully it makes it Lyzzybee sometime soon. 

Journal Entry 19 by LyzzyBee from Birmingham, West Midlands United Kingdom on Thursday, May 04, 2006

Hooray - it arrived today!

I am over half way through my current "at home" book (the wonderful "Lunar Men" by Jenny Uglow) so this will be started within the next week or so. Probably sooner - looks wonderful and it'll be great to have read the whole set. 

Journal Entry 20 by LyzzyBee from Birmingham, West Midlands United Kingdom on Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Just a quick progress report - I am half way through now and loving it! I should be done and have it sent on within the month allowed, especially as I'm a bit poorly at the moment, and we have a bank holiday weekend coming up.

It's interesting how much more I'm getting from certain sections of this book, and also the contrast in my LIFE, let alone anything else, from when I read the other two. Then, I lived and worked in London, working for a library supplier, and bf was an IT contractor. Now we have downsized hugely, he's a masters student and I'm a library cataloguer and we live in Birmingham. Lovely to belong to BookCrossing for long enough to read sets of books across changes like this. Anyway - what I've just been loving is reading at the end of Section 1 about the great 19th century collectors, especially as I happen to have been cataloguing sales catalogues from the sales of some of their collections!

Look forward to the rest of it and will try not to bleat on so much in my 2nd review.

Thanks again for adding me to the list and glad it made it here eventually - worth the wait!

 

Journal Entry 21 by LyzzyBee from Birmingham, West Midlands United Kingdom on Monday, May 29, 2006

Almost finished this wonderful book and PM'ing pennina for address info. 

Journal Entry 22 by LyzzyBee from Birmingham, West Midlands United Kingdom on Sunday, June 04, 2006

Have finally finished this off and have Pennina's address so will be posting it off in the week. Thank you for the chance to read this and the other two books in the series - all wonderful! 

Journal Entry 23 by LyzzyBee at Sent to another BookCrosser in Controlled Release, --by post or by hand (ie ring, ray, RABCK, trade) -- Controlled Releases on Saturday, June 10, 2006

Released 5 yrs ago (6/10/2006 UTC) at Sent to another BookCrosser in Controlled Release, --by post or by hand (ie ring, ray, RABCK, trade) -- Controlled Releases

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

RELEASE NOTES:

Mailing to Pennina today or Monday. 

Journal Entry 24 by pennina from Brighton & Hove, East Sussex United Kingdom on Wednesday, June 14, 2006

Thanks LizzyBee and Rutchmather! Like Tramgirl, I had also completely forgotten about this book. I think that, after 3 years almost, I could be forgiven. I'll not promise to finish it but I'll give it a good shot:) 

Journal Entry 25 by pennina from Brighton & Hove, East Sussex United Kingdom on Friday, January 26, 2007

I've had this book for so long it had quite gone out of my mind, thinking I had already posted it on. I really can't remember too much about it except the extraordinary amounts of money changing hands. I know someone who deals in rare books and now know how he affords what he affords, lol! I learned a new word too, I remember looking it up...but sadly now forget what it was. How sad it is to get old! I'll recognise it if I hear it again though and might look intelligent for 5 minutes.

My apologies to AnglersRest for making her wait so long and thanks to Rutchmather for lending it:) 

Journal Entry 26 by AnglersRest from Teignmouth, Devon United Kingdom on Monday, January 29, 2007

Arrived this morning, thanks Pennina for sending on. After 3 months, I finally have reduced my ring pile from 10 books to 2, including this one, so should be moving within a month or so. This will be home reading though, as it is a chunky book! 

Journal Entry 27 by AnglersRest from Teignmouth, Devon United Kingdom on Wednesday, April 25, 2007

I have had this book much too long, but I have devoured it slowly! This arrived but remained as home reading because of its lack of portability. What a wonderful read, and I have just purchased my own copy of this super book. I especially enjoyed reading of the library of Samuel Pepys, and the historical aspect of how libraries became established.

I have sqdancer's address, so this will be in the post, probably surface mail on Monday 30th April.