highlyeccentric: Sign on Little Queen St - One Way both directions (Default)
highlyeccentric ([personal profile] highlyeccentric) wrote2008-05-03 07:14 pm
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On children and books

[livejournal.com profile] niamh_sage quotes this old article on Neil Gamain:

Gaiman was born in Portchester, England, in 1960 and says he was "a much weirder kid than I ever thought I was". At seven he begged his parents for his own bookcase and carefully covered each book in clear plastic and put them in alphabetical order. He throws his hands up and says "Now that's f---ing weird! No seven-year-old does that."


Oh yeah, Mr Gaiman? I take your covered-and-alphabetised bookshelf and raise it one mostly covered and completely alphabetised bookshelf, *with handwritten white tags on all the fiction books saying things like F-MON and F-BLY*. If I knew the Dewey system I'd have tagged my non-fiction as well.

By age seven, I understood that the natural state of books is Catalogued and Labelled. Not bookshop-pristine, oh no. That is nice, but a book is not truly a book until it is in a library.
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[identity profile] suojure.livejournal.com 2008-05-03 10:53 am (UTC)(link)
I spent years covering my books and alphabetizing them. Now I tend to clump them by subject (except the fiction ... but they're a whole different book case). I came home from three years in Japan and immediately noticed my non-fiction book case had been messed with - apparently my "random organisation" offended my mum's sense of aesthetics, and she'd redone all my books by size. *cries* I haven't bothered to sort them out because my son tends to just grab anything within reach and ... either rip them, draw in them, stick them in suitcases or in drawers or drop them in the dog's water bowl.

[identity profile] highlyeccentric.livejournal.com 2008-05-03 10:59 am (UTC)(link)
that is a sad sad state of affairs. :(

you have my sympathies.

[identity profile] daiskmeliadorn.livejournal.com 2008-05-03 10:57 am (UTC)(link)
me too! although i wasn't quite dedicated enough to do my whole bookshelf i think but i did devote some energy to playing librarian...

in year 6 my friends & i got told off for spending too many lunchtimes in the library.

[identity profile] highlyeccentric.livejournal.com 2008-05-03 10:59 am (UTC)(link)
library nerds unite!

[identity profile] blackbuttoneyes.livejournal.com 2008-05-03 02:14 pm (UTC)(link)
By the by, Mr Gaiman is in Sydney this coming Tuesday and Wednesday doing signings, I believe. Nice timing with your post =D

[identity profile] highlyeccentric.livejournal.com 2008-05-03 02:16 pm (UTC)(link)
I know. I'm supposed to be going to one or other of them, but I'm not sure if I'll have time.

[identity profile] blackbuttoneyes.livejournal.com 2008-05-03 02:18 pm (UTC)(link)
I hope you enjoy if you do. I missed him when he was in New York two weeks ago =(

[identity profile] bwhawk.blogspot.com (from livejournal.com) 2008-05-03 02:34 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm not sure if I'll have time.

Make time. A signing with Neil Gaiman is worth it.
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