This is inspired by an essay by Walter Benjamin entitled "Unpacking My Library". I do hope the gentleman isn't spinning in his grave.
Yesterday, I packed the first box of books in preparation for our move in late June. It was a mixed bag of books. A Penguin Classics edition of Beyond Good and Evil that I can get rid of; how many copies of Walter Kaufman's translation of that work do I need? A biography of Queen Victoria. Several works by Rudolf Bultmann. Adolf von Harnack's What is Christianity?. Ernst Troeltsch's Religion in History. An overview of the linguistic theories of Noam Chomsky. Some of those small volumes from the Loeb Classical Library Series that I am quite sure I will not read but love because of what they are. Lady Chatterley's Lover.
I also set aside a few volumes. A couple slim volumes from Lisa's seminary days. A book on the relationship between Martin Heidegger's philosophy and personal political views that challenges the conventional American view that the two can be separated. A translation from the Ugarit of ancient Canaanite myths and legends.
There is far to go, but what surprised me yesterday was as much the decision of what to keep as the decision of what to discard. There is no rhyme or reason to it. I already mentioned the Loeb books. I am quite sure I am not going to sit and read Sophocles any time soon; I cannot bring myself to part with them. On the other hand, the book on Heidegger, which I read once years ago, might come in handy. One book in particular I am keeping for nothing more than sentimental reasons; it is entitled Forbidden Knowledge, and it covers issues of censorship, what is and is not proper literary fodder. It considers, among other titles, "Billy Budd" by Melville, the works of the Marquis de Sade, and what reading these texts can teach us even as we carefully weigh their moral merits, or lack thereof. I am keeping this particular text for the sole reason that I sat and read it in the hospital while waiting for my wife to go in to serious labor with our older daughter.
As I move through the shelves of books, I am going to be forced to consider whether or not to keep many, many volumes. Compared to my incomplete set of Karl Barth's Church Dogmatics, the three volumes of Emil Brunner's Christian Dogmatics might stay, or it might go. I have read these three volumes, while I am still putting off finishing the rest of Barth; on the other hand, Barth is far better to read (mostly) than Brunner. If I had to guess, I will dip in to those thick, black volumes from T&T Clark far more than the little paperbacks from John Knox. Yet . . .
And what of owning both the Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers, which both contain copies of the complete Constitution in the back? I have a copy of the collected writings of George Washington that I found so horrible to read - he was quite a self-righteous prig, our first President - that I couldn't finish, and will in all likelihood never crack again. I have several volumes on Watergate; how many versions of that particular event do I need? I have two volumes of the official biography of Winston Churchill; a one-volume bio by his official biographer, Martin Gilbert; the first two volumes of William Manchester's incomplete biography; and the one volume biography by Roy Jeynkins. Do I need all of them? What of my biography of Franco? DeGaulle?
Then there is my philosophy shelves. Volumes by and about everyone from Aristotle to Weissman (I don't own any Zizek; yet). A multi-volume consideration of the thought of William Ockham. Multiple volumes of Ernst Bloch, Plato, Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn, Nietzsche, Schelling, Fichte, Kant, Hegel, Rousseau, Heidegger . . . I sometimes feel I'm drowning in Teutonic prose. St. Thomas offers a respite, to be sure, and I have quite a few volumes of his works as well. But what about Imre Lakatos' Collected Papers? Interesting, and they have fed my own thinking in many subtle ways. Yet, should I or shouldn't I . . .
In an essay entitled "Unpacking My Library", Walter Benjamin reports a conversation he had with someone who was visiting his home and asked about a particular volume that Benjamin was just then talking about having purchased. Was he, Walter, going to read it? Oh, no, replied Benjamin. Books, for Benjamin, were as much objects d'arte as they were things of practical value.
I cannot afford such a luxurious view; in reality, neither could Benjamin. I have three thick, heavy boxes I picked up at work last night that I am going to fill with books over the weekend. I wonder if I am going to succumb to what I think of as the Benjamin temptation - to view my books as being precious merely for being. Between my wife and myself, we have hundreds of volumes to pack, move, then unpack and arrange, yet again. I do not have any coherent criteria for keeping or discarding this or that volume (Lady Chatterley's Lover? I could part with that, but yet . . .) and as I keep thinking the library just has to get smaller, I wonder if any will develop. Will I be plagued by fits of nostalgia and snobbishness? Will I continue to hold on to Helmut Thieleke's Christian Faith even though the first chapter is a detailed critique of "Death of God" theology that hasn't been in serious vogue for over a generation? His volume on nihilism, sure, but this?
Part of me thinks it would be interesting to just get rid of all of them and start fresh. Could I do that?
Could you?
UPDATE: Why, oh why, am I keeping The Chicago Manual of Style? I think I have issues.
