BY JOHN JENSEN
The figure often quoted is 180,000. That’s the number of books published in the UK every year. There’s the usual rubbish, of course, which is not bought or, if bought, is soon abandoned to Oxfam. Other books linger. I own a substantial library. Some books I’ve had for decades and still haven’t squeezed everything I want out of them. The problem is – life is too short! You work, you come home tired, you eat, watch the news, play with the kids, or argue with them depending on age, there’s not much time left to study art, or read works which, unless you make notes, you will never remember. If you are a one or two subject specialist it is more easy to immerse yourself in your interests, but if you are an intellectual gadfly intrigued by a thousand-and-one things life and reading is much more complicated. Plus, of course, there’s satire and humour and all those classics which you intend to read ‘someday’ but never will. My partner used to say, rightly, that we can’t afford them or the space. ‘No more books!’ she used to repeat in total exasperation.
She had to give that up. Now it’s ‘No more bookcases. I’ll not have another bookcase in the house.’ I call her Lady Canute. That’s nothing to what she calls me.