Bookshelf Quandary

After two and a half months at our new home, I have bookshelves. I spent yesterday unpacking boxes and trying to decide which ones earned a space, since I have a limit. I feel as if I were being reunited with old friends. Best of all, I am reaping a small reward for the time I spent packing the books.

I went about the packing process methodically: Books I Want to Read Next, Good Books I Want to Keep, Shakespeare (2 boxes), music books, Southern authors, humor, art, photography, scrapbooking, books on the Holocaust and the Vietnam war, books of poetry (I won't say how many boxes).  I have several boxes of my signed first editions, some of which I'd love to sell, some with which I'd never part. Packed in their own boxes, I have so many paperbacks, especially classroom classics.

I was surprised at the number of duplications (in part because people who know me tend to buy me books for gifts). Most of them I have put aside for other book lovers to whom I will pass them along. I have several books from my high school days, with "Nancy Coats" written on the inside front cover.

Since I also have small bookshelves in the rooms I have outfitted for the grandkids, I move books in there for them too--The Borrowers, the Little House books, Where the Red Fern Grows, the Narnia series, many of them books I read with my own children when they were small.

The decision-making gets tough when I have the shelves filled but I don't have the boxes empty.  I had at least one full box of Shakespeare left over, for example. Do I put away the books I have already read (at least once) and keep the "To Read" stack? Already I find myself opening up old favorites. With Mother's Day a day or so away, I found John McPhee's lovely essay "Silk Parachutes." I first read it in the New Yorker, prompting me to write him (and to get a letter in return.) I also found a copy of Christian Hymns No. 2 (the one with "Trust and Obey" on page 1.)

I know so many people who read exclusively on eReaders now or depend completely on the public library. I do both, but I have an ongoing relationship with my books. It's nice to give them a little fresh air.

Bookshelf Quandary

Kristof's List: The Best Kids' Books Ever

Earlier this week, the Charlotte Observer ran a column by Nicholas D. Kristof that originally appeared in the New York Times entitled "The Best Kids' Books Ever." Since I love those kinds of lists, I meant to cut it out to add to my folder of other books lists (right next to my folder of best movies, best songs, etc.) In fact, I meant to go online and add comments of my own. Instead, I accidentally threw out the paper and didn't get around to looking for the column online until today.

Using a few key words, I googled and first landed on a follow-up to his column in which he discusses the overwhelming number of comments that followed the column. I also found another column, written just after the originally in which he formally apologizes to Roald Dahl (for omission of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) and lists other books that should have made the list.

Anyone who takes it upon himself--or herself--to produce just such a list runs the risk of forgetting one or more books that should have been included. Fortunately, the penalty for that lapse is minimal; in fact, one has much to gain from the responses. Without even looking back at his list, I know I would have included some of my old favorites, books that I believe stand the test of time: Island of the Blue Dolphins, The Borrowers, Pippi Longstocking, Charlotte's Web, and so many more. Such an exercise sends me first to my study, where I can peruse my own shelves, but then I have to go into the attic to shuffle through the boxes stored there (for some of which I have a carpenter beginning a new set of shelves in my bedroom Monday.)

One year, at the end of the school year, my AP English students developed their own top ten lists, and they came up with some great ideas. One boy, Andrew, created a list of his favorite books from each year of school, from kindergarten through senior year.

One aspect of Kristof's column I most appreciated was his promotion of the concept of reading aloud to one's children. Even if they can read themselves, there is something particularly pleasurable in listening to someone else reading. My best memories of fourth grade (maybe my only memories, except for the multiplication tables) are the times Mrs. Knott read aloud to us the entire Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder, followed by every bood she could find that was connected. She always stopped too soon.

My friend Bebe told of reading Where the Red Fern Grows aloud with her daughter Jennifer (now grown and a mother herself.) She said they took turns reading and crying together. You can't reproduce that kind of experience in any other medium--not even watching Steel Magnolias together. I've always believed that even older students loved to have teachers read to them. I have always found it odd that we can justify showing a movie in class, but we have get defensive about reading aloud. When I taught high school, I had some works that just begged to be read aloud: Truman Capote's "A Christmas Memory," Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the final chapter of John Gardner's Grendel, for example. My students jokingly called it "Story Time with Miss Nancy," but they didn't fall asleep.

I encourage you, especially if you have young readers still at home, to follow the link to Kristof's column and to look over some of his suggestions as well as those shared by his readers. Maybe you will think of a few that should be there too.

Kristof's List: The Best Kids' Books Ever