I talked about the decision making regarding giving up my extensive Penguin collection yesterday. I feel sad about that but today I am thinking about the happiness this collection has given me.

Penguin books are disappearing as the baby boomers of the world also disappear. I think a few young people appreciate the books but they have been the domain of the older generations. The books in my collection dated from 1935 to 1970. The world is a different place these days.

In collecting the Penguins I have experienced two overseas trips to the UK that were both great fun. We talked to booksellers, found rarer books, saw parts of the world not seen before. The first trip would not have happened if I wasn’t collecting these books.

While travelling on the first trip I also saw how many book readers and collectors started blogging. I started getting into that more so when I returned home. I have had the best experiences blogging. I have made bookish friends in Australia as well as in England. I have met and stayed in touch with three people in the UK,  one of which has a blogs, one that is also a Penguin collector. One person from the UK has visited me in Tasmania and is coming back again in March.

I am a member of the Penguin Collector’s society and their publications have been excellent. I will continue to support them.

I am on a first name basis with all the book store owners in Hobart because of the time I have spent in their store looking for Penguins. I have enjoyed their enthusiasm.  The Penguin network goes through out the world.

I found a first printed Penguin in South America. A No 1 book, 1937,  written in Spanish. That was exciting. I have a French Penguin from that country.  I am always happy when I see that little bird on the bottom of a spine with a number next to it.

I have conducted four presentations through schools for seniors in Tasmania about the history of the Penguin publications. As I shared the various Penguin series with these people, I saw what a  great deal of pleasure handling the books and retelling their memories of Penguins in their life when they were growing up gave them.

I will continue to keep Penguins out of landfill but they won’t live at my house. They will all be gone one day, as nothing is permanent but the attachment will not lie with me anymore.

I will enjoy the Penguin series of poetry, classics, handbooks and Kings that I will retain for now.  One day they too will find new homes.

I look forward to chatting to others about the books that aren’t Penguins and that don’t live in boxes in closets and under the bed any longer.

After considerable thought and having way too many books in the house, I have sold my main collection of the Penguin collection.  I packed up 13 cartons of the books the other day and a local bookseller has bought the lot of the main series. It is close to 1000 books.I also have removed the small collection of Pelicans I had.

However I continue to save many of the books in the other series of vintage Penguins. I will keep everything else you see listed above, the poets, the classics, the Kings, the Puffins (maybe). I will also keep the ephemera.

I have had too many books that aren’t Penguins packed away in many boxes and in the drawers under the bed.  At night I found myself waking up and thinking, “There is too much in this house.” I am approaching the next decade of my life in another three years and I need to get rid of things while I am still able to lift and move things.

When I talked to the store owner I had to fight back tears as I have loved collecting them. I ask myself why I kept them in the first place. Answer: to keep them out of landfill.  As many of them came from the Tip shop I have achieved this goal.

I had contacted libraries and a museums but nobody has enough staff to catalogue them all and transportation of 13 cartons to the mainland is too much for me to handle. The cost would also be considerable. The man who bought them is a youngish guy and he loves books, probably more than anyone I know. (outside of myself). He has coveted these books for a long time.

I worry that if I or Mr. P left alone one day, we do not want to have to deal with this massive collection at that time. One must be pragmatic and realistic about the older years.

The exciting thing is the shelves are now filled with beautiful books I have collected that are not Penguins and the books I really do want to read and write about.

I have one whole wall devoted to built in shelves that will keep these books. I have had four additional full size book shelves full of everything else. One bookshelf is in the hallway and has my old book collection which I love. John Steinbeck first editions, Hemingway, Jack London and quite a few other older things. I have collected old hardcover books of dog adventure stories from 1800’s to 1950 longer than I have collected Penguins. I will spend some time with them and share those with you. I collect them mainly for the illustrations that are wonderful. They are books too that I would read.

Of the three bookshelves that are portable in the front library room two of them will be sold. I will have more room now for my computer, desk and furniture. It won’t be so cramped. It won’t be so cluttered.

It is true what ‘they’ say about clutter causing stress. My stress levels were starting to rise as I could not adequately control the amount of books I had. In the past couple of years including the Penguin sales I will have removed about 2000 books from this house. I probably still have between 500 and 800 books left but they all fit comfortably on the shelves. If they don’t fit then they will have to go.

As I read through some of the books I own I will be giving some away through the blog. I won’t need to retain most of them once read. 2017 will focus heavily on my own books. I am looking forward to it.

Part II of this post will talk more about the excellent experiences that have happened to me through this collection.

I will feel sad for awhile but once they are gone I will be happy to begin reading the books that have been in storage for so long and if there is room add a few more??

 

 

 

 

The other day I took the bus into the city and decided I would do some Christmas shopping. I tend to categorise my Christmas shopping i.e. My friend’s family, Mr. Penguin, people who work in the service industry such as the postman who walks up my steep driveway with cartons of wine or books, our veterinarians, hairdresser.

I picked up a couple of things and decided I needed to walk. I try to do two miles a day. That at least gets me started. Well it was sunny, the temperatures were in the high 20’s C (that’s 80s to you guys who don’t do metric) and there were several book shops I had not been in lately. I thought that I would stick with the second hand bookshops today.  I had gotten a call from Richard at Cracked and Spineless book shop to get in there to see all the early Penguin books he brought in. Well that’s a good way to get me out of the house. I rocked up and sure enough there was a box of them. Sadly there was only one I didn’t have and one first published to replace a reprint I had.

I snatched them up, much to Richard’s dismay I hadn’t taken more. I saw a stack of Viragos lying on the floor and much to my dismay they were all sold to a woman I hope moves to an island in the South Pacific and forgets to pick them up in the excitement of it all.

Never mind, I walked the three blocks up to the Red Cross book shop. This is truly one of the best and cheapest book shops in the Southern Hemisphere. Volunteers run the place, they have clear instructions to never throw Penguin books into the recycle bins and I went to see what was lined up on their shelf.

All at once Kevein appeared. Kevin is a very skinny bookish character in a hat, walks everywhere, has a beard and hoards books. (Think Dickens) Every time he sees me he comes running up and starts talking about books in his collection. Fiction follows this man. A lot of what he says it is made up. Though I don’t doubt he knows his stuff. He spends a great deal of time telling me about all the Penguins he has. You would think he had more Penguins than what Bristol University has in the archives. I know he hoards books. People who have been in his house say you cannot walk through it. One little path, like something one might see walking through the woods in Walden.

There could even be small animals living in his forest of books but I try not to think of it.

He tells me about series of Penguins I have never heard of. They do not exist.  One day I decided to start talking about a made up series of Penguin books. Time to get creative.  I described the covers,( a kind of retro stripe with the colours used in the poetry series). I  told him what the series number is- the R series through to 63 when they stopped publishing them due to changes in the company. 1950’s was the year- and waited for his response.

Sure enough he has a back room full of them. See what I mean?  What is the saying? You can’t bullshit a bullshitter?

So I am walking around the shop and he told me to not bother with the “Collectable shelves”. I ignored him. He followed me to them and showed me a couple of Boys Adventure day books he found from the late 1800’s (I see those all the time at the tip shop).  As he is jabbering at me I looked across the top shelf and lo and behold I see 6 old Penguin musical scores shoved into a corner. You can’t really see their spines. Penguin collectors can actually smell old penguins. There is a sixth sense of sorts.

When Karen (apenguinaweek) and I went to England several years ago she found a pile of these music scores and quickly preserved them in her collection.  It was a funny experience as the two of us would wander around a shop, find things to collect and coyly pay for the items and then share them when we were again outdoors. But as I was crashing her trip I had a rule in my head if we both saw something we loved she had first crack at it. After all books are only books. I knew I would find some later on and I did.  Yesterday I found seven of them. As I pulled them off the shelf with their beautiful covers (think early Penguin Poet’s series) all of a sudden Kevin’s mouth just went all quiet.  There really are divine moments when one collects something.  Smirk is not the word I would use to rub it in but oh boy, it was difficult.

Besides the music scores I also found an old Penguin Special and a Thomas Hardy poetry book (D53).  I happily took my books to the counter where  I was charged 50 cents per book.  Bargain.  So today I am showing them to you.  Know these books are now safe and sound and won’t be going into landfill anytime soon.

 

Celebrations were in order.