I inherited the hoarding gene. Both my mother and father were collectors; my father dangerously so, since the things he collected were mostly trash, piles on piles of scraggy newspapers that shrivelled and went rotten and yellow with the years. This monstrous marshalling of junk and clutter muddied and mangled his mind. Your immediate environment is the mirror of your psyche. If you stack trash about you, then so too will trash accumulate within. Tidiness is key to sanity. This is the root of that triumphant feeling one gets from having put everything in its right place. It is the reason Jordan Peterson’s simple and seemingly facile diktat of “clean your room” struck such a chord with millions of young men. Some people need reminding.
My father’s hoarding instinct was a contributing factor towards dreadful mental degradation. As he got older, he was unable to adapt his habits, incapable of parting ways with the crap he had amassed across the decades, and his house and so too his mind became a dumpsite for all that was excessive and unnecessary. I sometimes observe the things I collect and worry I am becoming a bit too much like him on this front. Unlike him, however, I possess the capacity to discard, to eliminate, to cut, to forego the stockpiling of superfluous nonsense. I inherited an urge towards curation and tidiness from my mother. I suspect her lineage balances things out somewhat for me genetically.
My mother collected books, but she was selective. Women have to be. A woman releases one egg cell a month. A man produces 1500 sperm cells a second. This disparity engineers the conduct of each sex. The need for cautious selection is encoded in the psychology of woman. The male surplus engenders a bent towards excess. These patterns are carried over into almost all realms of life. It is men who exhibit the extremest examples of unbridled immoderation, whether for good or ill.
As a child I collected comics. I still have thousands. They are the souvenirs of a bygone era. The things my mother bought me I keep to this day. She died when I was a child. The gifts she gave me are time capsules – for they contain memories that would otherwise be consigned to oblivion. She encouraged me to read, to draw, to write, to create. She was a teacher. I designed and wrote a digital art book at the age of 9 which she printed off and had bound. I no longer have it. A lot from my childhood was lost during the years of nomadism after her death – first when I moved to my aunt’s, later the years in foster care.
The book collecting habit surfaced in my late teens. It amped up into full-scale overdrive by my 20s. Over the past few years, I have scoured charity shops and second hand bookstores across the country, trying to track down great works on the cheap. I have built a sizeable library comprising classics, philosophy, political theory, economics, world history, science, the natural world, mathematics, psychology, business, art, and literature – all for the price of about half a year’s tuition fee at a British university.
This is a picture taken last year of 4 bookcases I had in my front room along one wall in my flat. There were more in other rooms. I have since moved. There are now bookcases dotted about in every room bar the kitchen. My two favourite writers – Nietzsche and Dostoyevsky – stand guard on the mantelpiece.
Italo Calvino was right about books. There are books I’ve devoured, multiple times, front to back, with furious amounts of underlinings. Books that fired the spirit, books that boiled the blood, books that exploded beliefs and books that fortified suspicions. Books that were so great I took to underlining almost the entire thing, which probably defeated the purpose. Books that need be read but once. Books that should have been left unread. Books that were dipped into and abandoned half read. Books with a chapter that looked decent. Books I picked up after having skimmed a page or two and decided to add to the cache of books that will probably never get read but that should be on my shelf anyway just in case. Books that complete a set. Books that were talked about in books I’ve read. Books I haven’t read that I talk about as if I had. Books I bought because I ought to know more about that topic but I simply do not have the time to sit down and study the molecular biology of the cell right now, but one day I might, plus it’s only £1.49, just get it. There are rare out-of-print books that sell for £200+ a piece on Amazon that I got for less than a tenner each because the guy selling them didn’t know what he had on his hands, but even if I wanted to sell them on and make £190 profit I can’t now because I’ve scribbled everywhere in them. There are books that are puffed up, padded out, glorified blog articles and would have been better off remaining as such. I put a book down if it bores me. I have at least 5 on the go at once. If you watch several TV programs and can keep track of where everything is at, why not the same with books?
I’ve opened an Instagram account dedicated to books. You can follow it – @francisaaronbooks. I’ll be posting pics and snippets on there and writing about them here. Thanks for reading.
Bibliomania
Suggestions of books for children under 10 would be very welcome. Young readers on objectivity, science, scientists, and skepticism perhaps. Or ones that blow holes in identity affectations. The Emperor's New Clothes for example.