I don't think it's any great secret that I love books. Collecting used books is a bit of a hobby. But what may be less known is the fact that I love seeing what sorts of books people discard.
I was at a Grand Rapids Goodwill store yesterday, and I found the bookshelves to be fascinating. Oh, you have the usual ones that litter nearly every Goodwill or Salvation Army: old John Grishams; hardcover Rush Limbaughs; multiple books on parenting, vitamins, and going through "the change."
And then there are the others. The Hamlets and the Macbeths, no doubt discarded after some high school or college English course had ended. Those are the saddest of all. Great literature, stashed away on a rickety shelf among myriads of books of far lesser quality.
As for me, I picked up a 49-cent copy of Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. And I considered that to be a successful "rescue" mission.
2 comments:
One of the first things I look at when I'm in a house for the first time is look at the bookshelves. They tell much more about the people who live there than the carpets or curtains. And, of course, their absence speaks (dare I say) volumes...
You know what I really don't get? Some people just don't like to read. At all. So they don't read. Except maybe cereal boxes. I really don't get it.
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