The Magic of Books about Books
Sarah Knight - a bibliophile and participant in the I Am A Reader project - explores her lifelong passion for books about books.
Like all participants in the I Am A Reader project - I love books. Projects like this get readers thinking: Why are books so special? What makes us, as readers, connect with them? But some readers take it one step further. Do you ever find yourself loving books so much that reading books isn’t enough; you want to read about books?
I have a whole bookshelf devoted to these books and - as they span genre, age, gender, race, time and place - I affectionately call them ‘books about books’. They don’t have to be exclusively about a book or books - they can be about libraries, librarians, bookshops, booksellers, book-loving protagonists, bookbinders, book thieves, grimoires, storytellers… you get the point.
Books about books seem to be popular these days but when I look at my favourite titles, there are more old than new - so I’m definitely not the first, or last, to feel this way. I’ve always had eclectic reading tastes and it wasn’t until I participated in I Am A Reader that I realised just how much certain books have shaped my life.
What do you see, hear or feel when you read? How do you read and why? Do you think that you are being creative when you are reading?
As a participant in I Am A Reader, I was encouraged to ask myself all of these questions and more. One theme kept cropping up in my answers - books about books. I wanted to understand why.
My passion for books started from a young age. As a lonely middle child (my childhood was incredibly happy but my parents worked long hours) I developed nothing short of a healthy obsession with every kind of book. As a young girl I preferred to live my adventures through books; being able to slam them shut whenever I was scared, which (as I was obsessed with everything witchy) was quite often. Books were safe. Living someone else’s adventures; someone I could inhabit and, more importantly, vacate at will.
Whenever I met a book-loving protagonist, I’d make a meticulous list of every book they referenced and beg my mum to take me to the local library. I’d watch in awe as the Librarian not only sought out every book but, with an all-knowing smile, correctly guessed which book had inspired the list. Rare treats would be a trip to Ottakar’s (now Waterstones but sadly without the snuggly sofas I loved as a child) and, best of all, a book that would belong to me and me alone - one that I could keep forever.
As I grew older, books inspired me to do more. To be more. I started to create my own to-read lists, always trying to find books that pushed expectations and boundaries. I remember reading If on a Winter’s Night a Traveller (by Italo Calvino) for the first time and thinking it was a book about books that broke all the rules. Imagine going into a bookshop and buying a book. But there’s an error in it. You get a replacement. But it’s a totally different story. You track down the original (you think) but it’s another story again. As a reader, I was taken on a journey through many different books within one cover. I realised that the best books break rules and, most importantly, that the reader (I, and you) could be the hero of the novel.
Books began to change my life. I started to imagine a better world. I wanted to find my own words to define and live my life by. Every book I read inspired me to find myself and to tell my own story. That sounds like a contradiction but it isn’t. I don’t know how old I was when I first realised that words have the power to change readers. The protagonists I loved most were brave, stubborn and found their own way against the odds. They made mistakes, grew and changed. They inspired me to do the same - to find my own way. It was books that I turned to at the most difficult times. Sometimes I could only process what was happening in the real world by exploring my feelings through a book - either seeing them mirrored (and seeking to understand them), or seeing something or someone better (and striving for more).
When I experienced profound loss at a young age I felt that my precious words had abandoned me. I didn’t have the words to describe grief. It was books that made me see that, although I wasn’t the same Sarah, some parts of me would never change - I’d just discovered some new words. Novels were a safe place to explore my feelings through the eyes of someone else (especially as most stories deal with loss in some way). The Book Thief (by Markus Zusak), famously narrated by Death, follows a girl called Liesel as she takes her first book (The Gravedigger’s Handbook) from her brother’s graveside and begins a much bigger journey through books and words. This mirrors and informs her life in Nazi Germany, which is all the more perilous during a time of controlled reading and book burnings.
Objects hold great power in stories. None more so than books. Some books about books, like Fahrenheit 451 (by Ray Bradbury), confirm what we already know; books are powerful. It is a message that is more important than ever. Some say that the book (especially the paperback book) is a dying object - I disagree. The book itself is a magical object. All readers instinctively know the magic of a paperback book when they hold it within their grasp. And, magic aside, the book as an object is comforting and familiar. Reader and writer have an important relationship - one that the book binds together.
After many years and advances in digital books, I still prefer a paperback book. I still annotate every blank space I can find - and not necessarily relating to the text. Perhaps my first attempt at a very bad poem, a riddle I’ve made up or a random sketch. I know, I know! Annotating books… It’s a contentious subject, right? Especially admitting it in a blog for a libraries project. But I’ve always felt deeply connected to my books. The more worn, the more read and the more annotated = the more loved. I still read every day (a habit I don’t think I will ever break); these days with my Dachshund, Mr Darcy, and a strong coffee.
Before moving on, I should perhaps add that I never annotate library books. Not because of library rules, but because every reader deserves that immersive and unique experience (without being hindered by the thoughts and feelings of another reader).
As I look back on my own journey to becoming an avid reader - perhaps it isn’t surprising that my desire to read books about books increased as I aged. Many of the participants of I Am A Reader discovered a love of reading at a young age. They realised the magic of books at a time when magic was all around them. But here’s the best part: once you’ve discovered the power of books you know that you can return to them at any time, at any age. They’ll be there, waiting for you.
Looking back at some of my own answers to the questions asked during the project, I can see the link as to why I have always loved books about books. I understood the power of books from a very young age. Is it therefore surprising that I want to read about them? Explore their capabilities? Understand their importance? Push their powers to the limit? I couldn’t constantly read book-themed fiction; I crave variety! But I can see now why it’s not at all surprising that I often choose to.
One of the things that did surprise me during the project was how two very different participants could answer the same question with a similar book. I guess that’s what all book-lovers share - we know that books have the power to change lives.
I still have books from my childhood, some books that I’ve owned for 20 years or more. My own home library has expanded rapidly over the years - every dog-eared, stray and secondhand book finds a home within it - much to the dismay of my family who have had to learn to live with books in every room. But despite my ever-growing collection I still look at the books from my childhood, sitting on the shelf looking back at me, and I know that those are the books that changed my life. Those are the books that made me truly understand the magic of reading.