"Tom L-M" <sabran DeleteThis @lintern-mole.fsnet.co.uk> wrote in message
news:c6ng0t$97k$1@newsg2.svr.pol.co.uk...
> > William M. Klimon:
> I'm convinced, though, that it is
> > possible to collect on a budget. You simply have to substitute time and
> > know-how for money. If you're patient, you'll find things for your
> > collection or things you can sell or trade up for things for your
> > collection.
>
> Other than special occaisions such as birthday's and christmas, my
> collection has been built using only my Satrurday wages, and proceeds from
> selling other books Ive picked up.
>
> At £25 a week I feel I have done pretty well in assembling a collectio
> containing some scarce and hard to find volumes, often on sought after
> topics such as Middle Eastern Travel, C20th Literature in 1st Edition
> etc...but, its hard work and takes alot of time to find those items within
> my budget....
The thing is, it is really a hobby. If it takes a lot of time, as
you say, well, stamp collecting and bird watching. can take
up a lot of time too. In addition to acquiring books suitable
to your tastes, you are having the fun, the thrill of the chase,
whatever, of putting your collection together. Most important,
it is your library, with the books which interest you.
Actually, the idea of simply paying a large sum of money
and having someone put together a library for someone
else with buckets of money strikes me as rather pathetic. It
suggests that the person purchasing the library does not
really read too much and will probably never read more
than a very small fraction of the books purchased. It is
more of a way to acqure a veneer of culture and impress
visitors to one's mansion than anything else.
Furthermore, 4,000 books isn't REALLY that
many books, unless they are the right books, and
what might be the right books for one person could
be the wrong books for someone else. I have
browsed bookstores with more books than that
and have had a difficult time finding even one
book that I wanted.
It should be stressed that I am not talking about a book
collector who purchases an entire library because he or
she is very familar with the contents. Our former
mayor of Los Angeles purchased an entire library
from a small liberal arts college which was closing.
I believe the sale was reported to involve over 20,000
books. However, that was a perfectly rational and
sincere thing to do, because the mayor was well aware
of the contents and had the room to house the books.
Rather than cases like that, I am referring to someone
who pays a book dealer a large sum to have the book
dealer build the library for them. That strikes me as
shallow.
Also, I am not sure this matter has been reported
correctly, because $7.50 a book sounds suspiciously low
for what you might expect to find in a billionaire's library.
Don't expect too many Folio Society and Heritage
editions. Instead, it sounds like a great way for a
bookseller to unload a few boxes of those "skivers"
which have been gathering dust for years if not for
decades. Also, in the late Nineteenth and early
Twentieth centuries various publishers--Hearst,
World, and many others--came out with vast numbers
of cheap editions of books which had been classics
for decades, if not for generations already. For $7.50
a book, you would almost have to anticipate a lot of that
sort of thing. The only first editions you could expect
are first editions of books most people don't want to
read in the first place.
What I am suggesting is that while many
serious collectors could build a respectable library
for an average of $7.50, essentially through their own
efforts in scouting bargain tables, public library sales,
etc., the price sounds extremely low for someone who
was trusting a bookseller to do all the work--and no
genuine book lover would do that in the first place.
(Since a movie director was mentioned, let us
charitably assume that misreporting was involved
and the books were meant to be props in an
upcoming film.)
Mr. Palmer
Room 314
>
> Cheers,
>
> Tom Lintern-Mole
>
><!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
>> Stay informed about: assembling a library 
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