18 October 2009

From the bookshelves 46

played in a filmed retelling of this story of stolen indentity . . . not a problem peculiar to the twenty-first century. Natalie Zemon Davis was a consultant historian for the making of the film . . . and of course the book delves deeper into the documentary evidence of the story.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This may be a silly question.(or few;) Do you own a bookstore? If not, how many bookshelves do you have? Do you read the books you post? Or is it just to share with us?
It is rare that I recognize a book or author that you post. I feel a little bad about that. Maybe it's just my age and Georgia education. I didn't finish college, either. That probably doesn't help..lol.
I'm hoping that one of the new books you show me will 'pop' to me and will suit me.

Alan Richardson said...

No silly questions . . . I have helped out in a used book-store for the last year and three quarters. It is now closed. I didn't have the where-with-all, or the blessing of my wife, to take it on.

The books on the blog are from my personal collection. Mm . . . I have fifteen book cases averaging about three feet width with five shelves each. That's about 225 shelf-feet and say about eight books a foot that comes to 1800 books, a very small collection; and that includes my wife's collection of children's books and text and reference works. That's not counting the books on the floor. I have no system for storing them for retrieval and I have read most of them, some more than once. A few remain unfinished, and many have been lost in moves as well as through selling and not having lent books returned and I'm sure I have a couple which I borrowed and did not return to their owner . . .

I think the last newish book I read was The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich published last year.

I have the complete (contemporary)GRANTA numbers 1 to 108 Chicago, a literary mag; that's where I read most new travel writing, essays, fiction, non-fiction and occasional poetry.

Alan

Anonymous said...

I have read some of the Granta as well. It was a few years ago. I think I donated them to a yard sale or goodwill later though. I usually kick myself later for doing so, though.
My collection might be that big if I'd not given so many away over the years. I worked at a new book store that closed, too.
I got to decover a lot of books for disposal. They do that with paperbacks. The books are thrown away and the covers are mailed back to the publishers. I would keep the books I wanted. I hated throwing good books away.
My mom kept a subscription to Issac Assimov's (spelling of his name?) sci-fi magazine when I was growing up. It had wonderful short stories and poems and such in it. She would also get another one that I just can't remember the name of.
I really want to post some of my own books, like you are doing. I haven't because I didn't want to seem too cheesy or eager. How silly is that...approval seeking online. I think I will, it will be good for me to not worry so much what someone might think.