I got a couple of belated Christmas presents this weekend and wouldn’t you know it, I’ve already read these books. I just hope this doesn’t scare my family and friends into never giving me any more books you know.
One book I received was Ex Libris by Anne Fadiman. I’ve already returned it but didn’t have time to look for a new book so now I have a little gift card burning a hole in my purse. I can’t wait to go back to the bookstore to choose something else.
The other book was Ines of My Soul but the Spanish edition. I just read this (book review to come) and didn’t like it enough that I’d re-read it but I really wish I’d read the Spanish version instead. It’s really a lovely edition so I’ll keep this one on my bookshelf.
Anyway, pulling out Ex Libris from my bookshelves I started to look through some of the “confessions” and really enjoyed re-reading the essay on Marrying Libraries. In my case, my husband and I have a lot of books but we don’t typically read the same books so when we got married we didn’t have to go through our books to see if we had duplicates. Even if we did, chances are he’d have the book in German, but the other day I noticed something that made me laugh. We have three copies of Siddhartha by Herman Hesse – in Spanish, English and German. Now we just need to read the book. Ha,ha.
Haha. Might be an interesting comparison in translation techniques. I don’t think H and I have any of the same books since he almost only reads Non-Fiction. There were a couple that he told me about that I wouldn’t mind reading but his are in Japanese. So maybe I will get the English ones at some point.
Oh I love Ex Libris. Fadiman reminds me that I’m not along in my book fetish. In fact, I think I’ll go and pull it off the shelves right now.
Marrying Libraries is a great essay. My hubby and I had very few books in common, so for the most part it didn’t apply to us.
And, Siddartha is great. You should definitely read it at some point.
I hated Siddartha when read it 8 years ago but it is a must read. At least you have your choice of language…
OK, now I want to read Ex Libris. When we got married, we had hardly any duplicates–but we did have to come to a decision about whose Hobbit/Lord of the Rings collection we would keep. 🙂
Hooray for belated Christmas gifts! I’ve really got to get my hands on Ex Libris. I’ve heard nothing but good things about it from a variety of readers.
Tanabata – I’m kind of glad my husband reads different books. That means more books around here. I occasionally go over to his side 🙂
Ann Darnton – Isn’t it a great little book? Have you checked out her latest one? I’m curious about it.
Alisia – I do plan to get to Siddhartha this year – finally! It’s one of my challenge reads 🙂
Nessa – Oh no! I’ll keep you guys posted on what I think of it. I admit I’ve been a bit hesitant to read it but we’ll see.
Tiffany – Ha,ha.. That’s great. I highly recommend Ex Libris and especially that essay is really good.
Andi – I know, isn’t it great to get gifts after the fact? You can just keep on celebrating! You need to check Ex Libris out – I think you’d enjoy it.
You guys can start a Siddhartha collection. I’ve heard of this guy who goes around the world collecting The Little Prince in all its various translations: German, English, Spanish, Russian, Chinese etc.
Dark Orpheus – Ha,ha. I think we should. I love the Little Prince collection story. I wonder what started that.