⁂ a paean to personal librarianship ⁂

you are the librarian…

You are the librarian of your own life. No one else can build your library for you.

Your library is not one thing. It exists in manifold manifestations: physical and virtual, corporeal and abstract, now and future.

Your library is a sanctuary. Your library is a social space. Create it with care for yourself and others.

Don't be afraid to make your library weird.

you are the reader…

Your relationship with books is complex, evolving, personal.

Read widely. Read long books and short ones. Read lifeworks, magnum opuses — fonts of inspiration for reading (and not-reading).

Read for many reasons: knowledge, pleasure, discovery, poetry.

Read fewer books — better books.

Don't take notes. Stay in the book. Get good at the gloss.

Read often, but only when the time is right. Read a little every day; a lot some days.

Track your reading, but only in your own secret way.

you are of the shelves…

Reading has seasons. Design for the ebb and flow. Rotate the crops of your psyche and self-image. Cull your shelves; cull your mind.

Reading well is about not-reading well. Abandon books. Read far fewer than you find.

Reread books. Consider which you'd centiread — read 100 times.

Practice networked reading; practice non-linear reading; practice metareading.

Assign yourself reading. Design your own syllabi. Don't let others assign reading to you, unless you trust them with your life.

you are of the book…

Different books carry different demands.

Be discerning — high filter; be serendipitous — high openness. Seek uncommon books. Sui generis books. Books that speak to you.

Don't be precious with books. Give them away, mark them up. Books are to be used. Books should live exciting lives.

Match each book to its reader — shadows of yourself; alternate librarians; unknown others.

Live with your books.

Explore edge case books — sort-of-books, almost-books…is an instructional manual a book? 20 bound cheese slices? a multimedia treasure chest? a real thick zine?

Reserve certain books for certain occasions — books for beaches or airplanes; for specific cities or seasons.

Invent new ways to talk about books, share them, apply the magic therein.

you are the librarian and the antilibrarian…

Ignore algorithms. Master your own curatorial arts. Book discovery is contextual, emergent, personal, particular.

Know about more books than you read. For context, cultural import, significance to loved ones…or other, more inscrutable reasons.

There's no right way to organize your shelves. Organized, chaotic, shifting — you must experiment; you must play.

Attend to your proxy libraries — books you don't own, but to which you have access: friends shelves; favorite bookstores.

Reading implies not-reading.

Most books will remain unread; many are best not-read intentionally.

Your library implies your antilibrary.