In my line of work I am constantly amazed at
the weird and wonderful types of books people like to collect. You always come
across the bibliophiles who collect things like modern first editions. These
collectors are the norm. It’s the offbeat ones that always raise an eyebrow for
me. I’m intrigued to know why they collect what they collect, and how their
obsession started. Today, for instance, I had a customer call who wanted me to
compile a list of books we had available that had blue spines. Seems he was
collecting them to create some sort of arty wall feature slash bookcase. And,
only last week I fielded an enquiry from a lady who collected children’s books
that had butterflies on the cover. Turns out she collects them so that she can
cut out the illustrations for craft projects. Sacrilegious, I know! My
favourite of all time though is the guy who collected books with the last page
missing. I don’t mean the blank endpapers at the end of most books. I mean the
last text page! He collected them because he found it amusing to read a book
and not know the real ending. I never quite worked out why he didn't just rip out the last page of every book he came across. Each to their own, I guess! It got me to thinking what other crazy
book collecting habits are out there in the book-o-sphere.
My own book collecting habits are of the more mundane
kind. When I was a teenager I collected the Trixie Belden detective books. I’m
still fuming that my mother consented to lend them to a friend and they were
never to be seen again. I then went through a funny phase of collecting any
books that had my name in the title. How very self indulgent of me? Again, I was just a teenager and in my
defence had recently fallen in love with the novel Forever Amber, so it seemed only
logical that I’d be just as smitten with every other book with ‘Amber’ in the
title. This theory was soon debunked after I read Elizabeth Lowell’s, Amber
Beach (apologies to all Elizabeth Lowell fans out there). The Hare with Amber
Eyes is the next title on my book club list and it’s got rave reviews, so there
may be life left in this particular book fetish yet. It won’t surprise you to
know that now-a-days I collect books written by people who run, or have run, second-hand
or antiquarian bookstores. You’d think this would be a fairly narrow sub-genre,
but actually there are quite a lot of books out there on the topic. It seems
nearly every second-hand bookstore owner puts pen to paper eventually. I also collect books
written by the great sporting coaches. I’m a netball coach myself and am always
looking to be inspired by the words of the masters. I collect them because the
good ones seem to be few and far between, and because I’m always inclined to
re-read them when I’m low on confidence. Last but not least, I collect any
books that deal with the history and current social plight of Aboriginal
Australians. For me, this last obsession is all about trying to fill the gap
that my white Australian education created. Sorry to end on such a serious
note!
So fess up! What types of books do you like to
collect, and why? Or, dob in a friend! They’ll never know.
