Ex Libris

This slim volume (162 pages, including the acknowledgements) has been on my bookshelf for quite a while, just waiting to be read. It was purchased after a writing/reading blogger I follow mentioned it more than once as a book which significantly influenced her reading and had a life-long impact.Like any essay collection, some I enjoyed more than others but found all of them to be interesting and enlightening. She writes about everything from her childhood, surrounded by books, to combining her library with her husbands only after being together for ten years and being married for five. I particularly found the essay 'My Odd Shelf' to be compelling as it directly relates to my own reading life and I have never heard another author address it.Ms. Fadiman grew up in a family much different than mine and it could be easy to classify her background (and therefore her essays) to be as upper-crust and snobbish. However, one of the reasons I enjoy reading is to understand others' backgrounds and perspectives. This collection accomplishes that, in addition to an excellent overview of significant literature that is helpful.Bottom line: Quite a good volume that is 4+ stars for me. I also purchased it recently as a graduation gift for a young woman who just earned her bachelor's degree in creative writing. It will be a nice addition to her library.

This little book has been sitting on my shelf for a while. I've dipped into it on a couple of occasions, always to put it down. I'm a great admirer of Anne Fadiman's "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down," so I couldn't quite figure out why "Ex Libris" did not hold my attention, even though some of the essays are delightful.Since the third time is reputed to be a charm, I recently picked it up again, determined to read it through. I did, and I also discovered the reasons for my struggle to enjoy the book. The first is the repeated appearance of The Fadiman Family (father, mother, son, daughter Anne, and Anne's husband, an honorary Fadiman). In these essays, the Fadimans, certified bibliophiles, are like interesting dinner guests who stay on for a game of Trivial Pursuit and end up winning it all before the other guests have put a single slice in their own little trivia pies. No fun.Perhaps the Fadimans overstay their welcome in "Ex Libris" because many of these essays were published separately in Civilization and later collected in this volume. Repetition is an all too common problem in essay collections.There may be a solution. Leave the book on the nightstand. Pick it up every few months and open the book to a random spot---middle, end. Read from front to back. Try back to front. The author even has a number of useful observations on reading in bed.M. Feldman

I purchased this as a !.99 kindle buy, and after finishing immediately bought 2 hard copies to give as gifts to friends who are readers. I could not have loved this book more - the author's love of books and of reading and of words and of family come through in a series of beautifully written essays on her lifelong relationship with books and scenarios that are original and familiar at the same time.

This is an enchanting book of essays compiled from articles originally published in Civilization, the magazine of the Library of Congress. The subjects alone are enough to bring a smile to any "common reader", a phrase used by Virginia Woolf (and borrowed from Samuel Johnson) to connote an educated layperson who reads for pleasure rather than scholarship or criticism. Ms. Fadiman turns a lovely phrase, and the reader will often feel they've found a kindred spirit. Topics include the intimacy of combining libraries, the enjoyment of long words, that odd shelf in your library, the carnal versus the courtly love of books, inscriptions, reading literature about a place while you are there, used books, proofreading, plagiarism, catalogues and reading aloud. While reading about these delightful subjects you will also learn about the author and her family, Arctic exploration, Thomas Macaulay and a host of other indispensable bits. The book succeeds on all fronts.It was a pleasure to read a book that made me break out the dictionary, and a dangerous little section at the back recommends yet more books that you probably don't need but that will undoubtedly make your life sweeter, as this one does. It can be read quickly, but you'd be wiser to savor it.Highest recommendation.

Such a lovely book of essays. Extremely enjoyable and fun. Don't miss this if you're a book lover. I feel that the author and I could be great friends, you will too.

If you love books, bookshelves, bookstores, writing or whatever your relationship is to books, read this. Can't wait to read her other essay collections.

Love this book! I give it as a gift to all my reader friends.

What a marvelous book!When Anne Fadiman started to describe the merger of her library with her husband's (never mind that they had been married for years and had children together, this was the event that convinced her they were *really* married), I knew I had stumbled on a kindred soul. Anne Fadiman can write, and she chooses to write about what it means to live a life surrounded by (and wallowing in, let's admit it!) books.Her love affair with the written word permeates this book. The details of her life are completely different than mine, but this book made me feel like I understood her from the inside out. I read large parts of this book out loud, to anyone I could find who seemed like they might find it amusing. Most of them ran out and got themselves a copy of the book. I can't read it out loud to you, so all I can say is if you love reading, if you are consumed with a love of the written word, Anne Fadiman's book will speak to the deepest part of your soul.

This lovely little volume is a collection of essays about books and reading - not just generalisations but deeply personal habits and experiences, such as reading with her partner by the Grand Canyon and merging libraries with him when they moved in together. I bought it after finding it frequently quoted from in `The Book Addict's Treasury' (by Julie Rugg and Lynda Murphy); I found it very enjoyable and once again I recognised myself in much of it, but it is very obviously American and sometimes slips into exaggerated self-righteousness and almost religious fervour and enthusiasm, which is quite offputting.All kinds of bookish behaviour is documented and explored within the eighteen essays. Some explore the various ways of shelving loved books - chronologically, alphabetically, by genre or some other method. Should your partner's books be merged with yours, and if so, when and how? Others look at the joy to be found in words - new words, magical words, complicated words. One discusses those books that just don't fit anywhere; one explores poetry; one entire essays explores the sinful habit of spread-eagling open books on a table instead of using a bookmark. One reflects on an ancient guide to womanhood and motherhood, hopelessly and terrifyingly out of date for a mother today. Some reflect on spelling, grammar, editing and storage. My favourite discusses the inscriptions made on the flyleaf of a book - and I have put extra thought into my own ever since! Recommended for book lovers everywhere.

You can always tell an obsessive/Compulsive reader and collector of books, they like nothing more than a book about books! And this should reside on the "odd shelf" amongst a number of others of its type all worthy of your time. This little book is sheer delight to the likes of you and I who would rather buy a book than probably almost anything else. I found myself between these pages, and in or between the definitions Ms Fadiman records. My parents were not quite as bookish at this stage, although they both claimed an obsession with reading in their youth, and we had books in the house; so as soon as I was able to earn pocket money it was straight up to the secondhand bookshop that resided in the less fashionable part of the high street to spend hours pouring over the possibilities to take up residence in my diaphanous bag home. The touch and smell were intoxicating and I would even put up with the grumpy storekeeper (and often they are old grouches - I often wonder if it is because they resent having to part with their finds!) in order to indulge my passion. A Christmas without a pile of oblong festively-wrapped parcels (my mother often felt I needed something more practical in my stocking!) was always a disappointment. Fortunately, it was also a rarity if everyone else was to have a good time! Also, perhaps not surprisingly my siblings followed in my footsteps into bookishness, and although we have many overlaps of taste, we tend to collect in different areas, so increasing the family horde.I live on the first floor of a small London flat, and my friends are always surprised not to find that I have, involuntarily, moved to the ground floor (hopefully when the current tenants are away!). It is a compulsion to possess both the physical book and the intellectual content of a book which is obviously why so often they are called friends. Ms Fadiman captures this in her essays. She also captures how like fragrance a book is, picking it up it is sometimes more evocative than a photograph of the time it was read, where it was bought or by whom it was gifted. I will certainly be gifting this volume to one or two over the coming festive season.I always loved the description that I heard Umberto Eco make in a documentary once, when he said that at night when he left his library, he often had a sense of all the books whispering to each other behind his back. It is a wonderful analogy of what goes on in any readers mind.

A charming series of short essays written by an American who loves her books - and she writes most entertainingly on all facets of owning and sorting and keeping books - the difficulty of deciding what to keep, as well as the challenge of merging collections when you move in with someone etc., etc. If you have lots of books and find it hard to part with any this book is for you...

Bookworms of the world unite! I just loved this book, I felt that I had met a new friend. It can be very lonely being an ardent reader, so I was very happy to find there are whole families of us! I like her style. The only thing wrong with this book is that it’s much much too short.

This book has been a great favourite of mine over many years, and I buy it as a modest gift for other book lovers. The essay is a very under-rated literary form these days, but this book really searches out the charms of reading and the value of literacy and literature. It is so personal, you warm to the writer and to her family, especially her husband. She has the ability to make the idea of reading fundamental to the art of living. Her own literary style, combined with humour, make this book a very elegant gift to share.