I so enjoyed reading all the comments on my last post about having too many books. It’s so comforting to know how many others there are out there who feel defined by their books.
It’s not a failing, it’s our superpower.
I also enjoyed hearing how people had gone about their own culls, although probably my favourite suggestion was: get more shelves.
Several of you said you’d like to see my Favourites area up close, so here we are. Perv away.
I’m 3/4 of the way through ‘The Dance’ and I’m collecting it in this specific edition, with the wonderful Mark Boxer illustrations on the front. Isn’t that man on the right SO the ghastly Widmerpool?
The Peter Carey 30 Days in Sydney is special for me, because I spent a day with him there when he was researching it. He’s lived in New York so long he needed someone to show him where things were at then.
I took him to Fashion Week and Cate Blanchett was doing a launch and it was hard to say which one was more suprised to see the other. That was fun.
At the time I was in the first stages of being actively edited for my first novel Pants on Fire, so I plucked up courage to ask him about the process, because I was struggling a bit with the process. I naively (I understand now) asked him if he was edited…
‘We go over every single word,’ he said. So that told me.
Then there are the books which shaped me in my teenage years, in the crucial grey Penguin Modern Classics. Isherwood (in a different imprint), Forster, Steinbeck, Fitzgerald, Orwell, Wilde, Huxley, Kerouac.
That’s an education on one shelf. If I’d read nothing else that would have been good going.
Then two of my favourite women writers. The incomparable Cynthia Heimel, who to my great joy became a friend and Tove Jansson.
Then Marie Kondo. A life changing book I need to re-read.
Next shelf down is a very mixed bag of favourites. Carly Simon’s wonderful memoir - the moment when she met James Taylor is so swoony, Mrs Miniver and then in great contrast, but equal in my heart, Pamela Des Barres’ memoir of being a groupie, I’m With the Band.
Siegfried Sasson, Rumer Godden then onto part of my Mitford collection. I was obsessed with them for a bit and Love in a Cold Climate, will always be seminal, but I’ve moved on a bit now from fetishising the British upper class.
Then it gets serious. Bob Dylan’s Chronicles. I just couldn’t believe he could write a book as mysteriously magically epic as his music - but then, why would he not? You come away feeling like you’ve walked along side him, but know him not one jot better. It’s like a sleight of hand. Amazing.
I Capture the Castle and Three Men in a Boat need no explaining - then we reach my all-time literary crush, Martin Amis. I can’t believe he’s gone.
This shelf isn’t favourites - although there are some great titles here - it’s a section of the enormous library of Penguins I grew up with, collected by various family members. When my mother downsized my siblings and I chose a section each and then donated all the rest. They’re hard to read now, they fall to bits, but they are part of my soul.
Three all-time favourites. It almost makes me tremble to look at them. All so good in such different ways.
I got to know Helen Garner a little when I lived in Australia, which was absolutely thrilling - she’s fabulous - and I’ve met Peter York a couple of times, most recently when he came to view my previous house when we were selling it (we ended up having a very fun sesh in our local), but I never met Martin Amis.
I know several people who had full-on affairs with him and I never even saw him at a party. I feel robbed.
My own books. They used to live in the back of the house in the study, but then I decided to be loud and proud.
These are all more recent needs and these two lower shelves need sorting, but one that really jumps out here is The Lie of the Land by Amanda Craig. I absolutely loved that book.
So that’s my book case of favourites. Want to show me yours?
I too , love Martin Ami’s.. but also Henry Miller, Kawabata,early Knausgaard, some of Robert Harris’ novels about the ancient Roman world , Johnathon Franzen..
I love perving at other people’s bookshelves, thanks Maggie. I need to read Martin Amis and Anthony Powell!
My bookshelves are weird, I work in a public library and don’t buy a lot of books, so they’re childhood and family faves, souvenirs from author events, books I’ve been given, and second hand books I’ve tracked down cos I couldn’t get hold of the title at work.
(Be cautious about relying on public libraries to have your favourite older books, friends, we have limited space and are constantly getting new books, and books do wear out and get damaged or lost, so our collections are in a constant state of flux.)
Meanwhile my shelves at home are embarrassingly disorganised—cook books and gardening are seperate, I have a rough division between fiction and non fiction, shelves all over the house, books generally in chronological order by date of acquisition. Any natural orderliness I might have seems to stay at work…
Can’t take photos it’s too dark but very much looking forward to others’ comments!