We grew up around books. Lots and lots and lots of books. My parents had a large house in Rockland County, NY, and it had a giant, unused space in the basement that my dad had fitted as a library with built in bookshelves and a huge entertainment system. He’d watch video lectures on great philosphers and art. When they moved to Virginia, the house was a lot smaller, but pop found some unused space under the deck and had it built out:
This room is much smaller than the one they had in Rockland, and the books aren’t organized in any way (in Rockland they were by topic), but it’s twice what you see in these pictures. The shelves are filled with knick knacks and just general junk from my parents’ travels around the world, the walls are covered with framed photos taken by my father. My dad has hosted numerous gatherings in this library, usually a bunch of Afghan guys sitting around, smoking cigarettes and drinking bourbon, talking about politics and religion and cursing the East and the West. Women folk usually stay upstairs, but I always have ventured down to join the men and I usually just listen and take it all in. The knowledge that can be gained from sitting with people who have lived more is amazing, even if what they say, factually, is completely off base.
But, back to the library, because there is a point here. I am like a kid in a candy store when I go downstairs. Or, let’s just say it – a nerd in a library. There are no return dates or overdue fines (although pop knows when something has gone missing for too long and all his books are stamped). And there is a book on just about any topic you could imagine – from tantric sex to vegetarianism and everything in between. We have a photo book on Carnival in Brazil. Why? I have no idea. We have volumes on Islam, Christianity, the Bagvad Ghita. There is nothing off limits or banned or censored.
Today I went down because I knew I had contributed John Rawls’ “A Theory of Justice” to the collection at one point and I wanted to retrieve it. I bought the book in college when I was doing my philosophy thing. It was used then, and now it’s even more battered and bruised.
While I have vague recollections of the premise of his theory (veil of ignorance, etc.) I’m eager to re-read and re-evaluate and see how much I’ve evolved since my dress in black, smoke cigarettes and pretend that I’m Simone De Beaouvoir days of old.
While most days, now, are spent with Federal Sentencing Guidelines or trial transcripts, heading down to the library reminds me that there is more to the practice of law than getting up and putting on a skirt, heels and grabbing your files. There is theory, there are thoughts and ideals. The room is filled with why I studied philosophy and why I became a lawyer. And while we debate back and forth about innocence, justice, and trial tactics, the room under the deck proves that there is room for engagement, disagreement and discussion on all topics big and small.
Between tantric sex and vegetarianism? There's nothing between tantric sex and vegetarianism!
When I visit someone's house, and it's not overrun with books, I wonder what is wrong with them.
Books are magic, that's for sure. Too many books, not enough time! Personally, I would rather own them than read them. I like to have lots of books around just to look at. I like to hold them and coddle them like a newborn baby. As an amateur photographer, I like picture-books too. I'm usually reading three or four books at a time, and finishing none.
The most recent book I read straight-thru w/out stopping was Marilyn, about ten years ago. I couldn't put it down. Yes, she was definitely murdered, by RFK and brother-in-law Peter Lawford. Way too much 'circumstantial' evidence, if you catch my lawyerly drift! Guilty, guilty, guilty?!?
Marilyn was the greatest. She bumped up against forces she could not overcome. That was her mistaken perception of reality. The Kennedys were too powerful, and ruthless.
Also, I like to savor my books. I chew slowly. Right now, am engrossed in The Real Anita Hill: The Untold Story. The real story is always 'untold', it seems. The verdict is still out, but does not look good for Anita. And I'm not a big fan of Doubting 'My-Lips-Are-Sealed' Thomas. I say, a curse on both their houses!
Am opposed to 'speed-reading'–an oxymoron. Either you're reading or speeding, but not both. That's like slurping down your lobster roll, or slamming your glass of wine. Or driving 90 mph on a nice country road during a pleasant Sunday afternoon outing.
No, no! I lost 5,000 books in New Haven because of the illegal and unlawful actions against me by City and State–which are the real reasons I post on the law blogs today. Also, 2000 records, videos and tapes. These were tremendous losses for me which can never be recovered or replaced.
However, I have re-started my library. I now buy and sell books, just like blawger N.P.; however at outdoor venues. I bought heavily this week at the Brewster Free Public Library annual summer sale. Never saw so many books for sale outside of Barnes and Ignoble. Everybody loves books, even ones by neurotic Norman Mailer, the onetime Cape Cod raconteur summer resident.
What's tantric sex anyway? Is that when you and your partner are so well-tanned that you are candidates for skin cancer?
My own book, available at a store near you soon! Ha! (No publisher will have me? Ahhh!)
Books, of course, are treasures.
Particle physics; Plato & Aristotle & Thucydides; Augustine; Homer, Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Milton, and Spenser; lives of Dickens and John Adams and Earl Warren, of George Armstrong Custer and Crazy Horse; Blue Highways; Hammett and Chandler; the Prose Edda of Snorri Sturluson; the Tibetan Book of the Dead and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance; the Little Red Book and Quotations from Chairman LBJ; dictionaries and grammars and histories of language; dictionaries of saints and artists and music and myth; all those books on legal theory and practice and criminal justice and the death penalty and the surveillance society; . . . .
To be read and savored. To be discussed.
Isn't that much of why we write these blogs?
Mark – no? I suppose they might be considered on a similar plane, both designed to feed the body, right?
Our current house is ridiculously small. Our books have gone to the library under the deck (it's 6 houses away from u). Our shelves currently hold about 2k record albums.
If you love personal and scholastic libraries I recommend following Bookshelf Porn on Thumblr.
http://bookshelfporn.com/