Cataloguing and culling - but running out of time . . .

I joined librarything because we planned to downsize and there would simply not be anything like enough space for my books. The plan was to catalogue them and cull enough into a 'not kept' category. Unfortunately . . . . it's been a slow process, we moved at the point where only 450 had made it to the not kept list but 100 were already in the 'not yet read' list. I hadn't anticipated this. Now, 'not kept' has grown to 570 but not yet read to 140, with cupboards and boxes full of 'not yet catalogued', no shelf space left, and time running out having entered my late 70's. Only consolation is the triumph of surviving the pain of telling old friends they're 'not kept'.

That's one of the reasons why I keep a running list of what I've not read yet. Hasn't reached the point where I need to note where each is located, but I could modify it to do that too.

And you've also observed a reason why a few years ago when I turned forty, I got serious about prioritizing 'books I must read before I die'. That's largely taken me off the grid of latest bestsellers and back to the classics, but no regrets so far.

Hopefully the 'not kept' are finding a good home, at least the ones you especially value/valued.

Glad I found this group. I thought that I was the only one with this madness. I'll be 62 in August, and my house and garage are stuffed with what must be at least two thousand books "To Be Read". In what lifetime? I have time to read about one book every month, so maybe I can enjoy one or two hundred of them before I croak. Yet just this month I bought another four or five, at well over $100. Well, there are worse addictions. At least I'm no longer hooked on ice cream!

I dread giving up the ice cream. But with regards to books, how is it madness to possess a library you can peruse at will, filled with books you haven't read and all of which interest you? Sounds idyllic to me, regardless whether you can read them all. It's only the $100 bit that snags me, but the collector on your left shoulder is still dancing in glee even if the reader on your right is just shaking his head. It's that collector fellow that causes all the trouble we bemoan in this group.

I'm only 30 and yet I already know that if I keep up my current average of around 5-10 books per year, and I live to be 90, I can only read another 300-600 books and I already have more than that on my to-read list. Perhaps I need to get a little more judgmental on which books deserve a spot on this list. (But how can you judge the book before you have read it?!)

Let's say I greatly increase my average, I might be able to read 1000 more books.

This whole thing is very depressing. I would much rather think that I have unlimited time to read all the books in the world.

So, read faster, cull more fiercely, or just accept the inevitable? :)

I do it a day at a time. . . no reason to get the tummy rumbles!

>5 loewen:, whew, and I thought I was in a bind at about 30/year. Plenty of folks around here boast 100+/year and I'm small fish next to them.

I'm a big fan of 501 Must-Read Books to help me discover and prioritize the true best of the best. But if you're a genre fan (SF, western, history, whatever) and already have a lengthy list of books to prioritize among, that's a different story. Then you could try "best of" lists for that genre. Example, if you like sci-fi/fantasy you could compare your collection with the NPR list: http://www.npr.org/2011/08/09/139248590/top-100-science-fiction-fantasy-books

But don't get 100% strict with yourself, that's just no fun. You could make it, say, 5 carefully researched titles and 5 whatevers per year.

A friend who is a writer told me that when you get to age 50, you stop thinking about what books you want to write and start thinking about which books you want to write. I suspect it is the same with reading. (I'm far over 50 now.)

>8 PhaedraB:, I consider myself an optimistic fellow, but I've been aware of the passage of years and the ultimate countdown since my late twenties. I wasn't applying it to books however until about a decade later, when I joined LT and really took stock of the quality I was reading (not that good), the quantity (surprisingly less than I'd assumed) and how I went about selecting it (practically random).