I was poking around the house yesterday, snuffling and snarfing my way through my cold, and hankering mightily to lose myself in a Robertson Davies novel. I surveyed the upstairs bookshelves and downstairs bookshelves, and could find neither the Deptford Trilogy nor the Cornish Trilogy. I asked Julie where they might be, and she didn't know. And then I realized that I'd probably loaned both books out to people; I love those novels, and encourage as many people as I can to read them. I'm a sucker for loaning my best beloved books out.
I thought about this yesterday, and was able to recall a few other titles from my shelves that I'd not been able to locate, and which I'm pretty sure I loaned to friends at some point. The trouble is, I can't remember to whom I loaned these titles. And truth to tell, I can think of at least three books on my shelf that belong to others, and I can't remember where I got them.
Loaning books, I'm afraid, is a bad business. I told Julie that I was going to stop doing it, because inevitably the books I most miss when they're gone are the ones I'm most likely to have loaned out. She replied, "C.S. Lewis said the only books you're going to have in your library in heaven are the ones you loaned out." Jeez, do I have to die to get my Davies novels back?!
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Here's another idea that works: Spray the book to be lent out with a strong perfume or cologne (that you don't mind smelling yourself). It will linger for the duration of the time the book is lent out, but it eventually fades (hopefully after the book is returned). It also is an incentive for the "lendee" to read the book fast.
"Anybody to whom you would lend anything valuable or anything you would miss is also someone in whom you should have trust that it will be returned and/or someone whose friendship you value sufficiently not to care that much if it isn't."
Amen. The book becomes a "gift"--because books are gifts, after all--and I move on with my life. Anyone who asks me for $20 when I borrow a book is not someone who I want in my life, since such miserliness and misanthropy is bad for MY soul.
Sorry, Bruce, you are now on the list.
Ha. Did I mention that I don't impose my values on other people or their property? :)
To be honest, I don't deal with dust jackets that often since I buy paperback most of the time. Of late I've encountered them more than I like on my toddler's books. In this case, the book covers have the same exact picture as the dust jacket (minus the marketing blurbs) and having to deal with the latter while reading to a toddler detracts a bit from the experience.
Oops! Rod, I've still got The Rage and the Pride by Oriana Fallaci(yours) sitting on my bookshelf, more than a year after you loaned it to me and I read it! (Excellent, btw, thanx!)
One of mine, which you have and are welcome to keep (I believe it was falling apart when I gave it to you) is by Robert Baer, in case that's one of the three or so to which you refe.
My book lending practice is to "lend" a book out and then buy a replacement for it (unless it's one in which I've done a lot of writing in the margins, in which case I make it really clear that I need it back and then follow up periodically in casual conversation until I get it).
I promise to get Oriana back to you one of these days (as I've been telling myself for over a year now)...
Several of my favorite books have disappeared over the years. I just chalk it up to "involuntary evangelism" and buy a new copy if I really need to have it around.
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