Author’s note: I found this mini essay in one of my notebooks. I don’t think I’ve transcribed it already, but if I have I’m sure I’ll find it as soon as I click”publish”.
Can a book be considered sacred without also being considered religious? I used to think so. That’s not to say that I don’t think books are important - I would go so far as to say they are necessary. But, 10 years ago, I would try and keep a book in as perfect condition as I could. People that folded a corner of a page down in lieu of a bookmark were all but dead to me -especially if it was my book. Food and reading were two endeavours enjoyed separately.
Now though, I see that all the little injuries help a book to tell two stories. The cracked spine opens this book to my favourite quote. The smooshed corner from when I thought I had lost it or lent it out, never to be seen again, only to discover it one day at the bottom of an old backpack. The story of the book itself becomes almost as rich as the story contained between the covers.
This revelation came from buying what turned out to be a secondhand book from the Internet. When I opened this copy of Call of the Wild, I saw a name had been inscribed. Joe Purcell. Thanks to the power of Google, I decided to do some research. I plugged in the name and found many Joe Purcells. I saw an artist, a governor, an actor, a lawyer, and a minister. Even though I had no way of knowing which Joe owned my book - almost certainly none of these men - it reminded me that all of our stuff has a story. But books have the added bonus of physically logging anything that happens to them.
Paper is almost forever.