apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I have trouble saying goodbye to a perfectly good book too...but yes, it does help to know it'll go somewhere it will be discovered and appreciated by new eyes...

hmm...I think it's about time for college book purge round 2...you know, the ones I thought I "might" reference "someday" and never did...you know the ones, you have/had them too! Turns out that wikipedia and google take a lot less shelf space than "maybe someday"

My wife and I are moving soon and just went through our books.....man that's tough! But we did manage to get rid of about 1/4 to 1/3 of them. Most of the books we ended up donating to 826CHI the after school writing workshop started by Dave Eggers at http://www.826chi.org/ over on Milwaukee in Wicker Park. They give a tax credit and are going to a great cause.
Have a great day!

I used to horde my books. 4 years of college 4 years of grad school = a lot of books. I kept the ones I actually use on a regular basis and sold the rest on ebay and amazon. Now, whenever I buy books, I just sell them and use the money to buy new books. It keeps the clutter down and helps fund my reading habit.

another great place to donate ( and pick up!! ) your books for free in the baltimore, MD area is the book thing
http://www.bookthing.org
GREAT place to pick up books and donate your books! You know they won't be wasted!

Getting rid of books is painful. We do it slowly, a few at a time. In the past couple of years, we've reduced by about 50%. It's a great start but we still have way too many for our little house.

You got rid of large format art books?? Can I rifle through your trash?

When I moved into my apartment I did a quick sort of books and took a large plastic crate full of books to the local used bookstore where I received all of $12 back for books that probably totaled $200.

I still need to sort books again, as I do not want to buy another bookcase. When I get rid of books this second time, I will be using http://www.bookcrossing.com/ and local coffeeshops to release books into the wild.

Thanks for the 826CHI tip, Patrick. That is a wonderful organization and will make a good home for any of our books that they can use.

I donated several boxes of books to Books for International Goodwill, based in Annapolis, MD. http://www.big-books.org/index.asp I'm sure there are similar organizations elsewhere. If you're in the greater DC/Baltimore area, this might be an option for you. They either sell the books to fund their shipments or send the books themselves.

My tip is to give yourself time, those books that seem too precious to part with right now can quickly loose their luster after awhile. I had a plethora of art and art history related books from my grad school days, and at first couldn't imagine parting with them. I moved cross-country a year ago, and left my books in storage at my parents house (near Annapolis coincidentally. ;). I find that every time I am back home, I am able to weed out more and more to donate and sell. With both time and distance between me and my books it has completely changed my perspective.

Wow. I went to St. John's too. (The Santa Fe campus.) Relax. Most "Great Books" are boring. Plato schmato. In fact, aren't most of those so-called Great Books available on-line through folks like Project Gutenberg? I dumped my 100 books in front of Cooper Union. You're gonna love reading and keeping more Phillip K. Dick and Samuel Delaney! Remember, you're not just getting more space on your book shelves; you are finally shedding a cult!

Another great option for donating books (and CDs and DVDs!) in the DC area is Books for America, http://www.booksforamerica.org/

my wife and I are two university professors in various fields (literature, film, art) and it's really difficult keeping our book count down and getting rid of books. but in a space of 600 sq. feet, we don't really have a choice. the fact that we also live in cambridge, ma where there's two great bookstores on every block doesn't help either. i did however manage to talk my wife into giving up her cherished encyclopedia britannica set that she received as a gift from her parents when she entered high school. we lugged that unwieldy, outdated set (30 volumes with the damn yearly updates and a ginormous atlas) around the country & after the 4th move, she finally relented. the britannica after all is now online at all university libraries & we just couldn't justify the luxury of having it. luckily it's still in the family sitting in her sister's much larger house. but it takes a cold perspective to get rid of beloved books.

donating books to prisoners is an environmentally and socially conscious way to pass along books to people who want and need them.

here's a couple of links to get started:

http://www.bookstoprisoners.net
http://pagestoprisoners.org

Hmm, too many Johnnies on this list (yes, me too). I still have all my program books, in my mother's basement, except for 4 different iliads, odysseys and some recent Herodotus purchases, and a couple of books "on" program books. I cannot bring myself to dump these, on which my essays were based. Pure nostalgia, but I can't help it.

I offered my most recent cull on freecycle, and most of them were picked up within a few days. I give the paperbacks to my office's "commuter" book shelf. Most of my new books are easy to part with, but I cannot give up these old greeks!

Wow. I go to St. John's, and I'd never throw out my books. I'm keeping them for when I'm paying back loans and have no money for books.

You can also donate your books to your local library. That way, if you really want to read/see that book again, you can just check it out.

Hello, my name is sciencegeek and I have a book problem. However, unlike the rest of you, I'm unrepentant and enjoy having "too many" books. I have reread many of them, enjoyed them over the years and plan to keep on doing just that for the foreseeable future. I also enjoy sharing them with my family and friends. This is one part of my life that will never be minimalist or reasonable.

OMG! my dad went to St. Johns College. When he died we were going thru all his books. It's been 3 years and we still have his St. J's classics. I love books but have no qualms about getting rid of them, except for those.
I can remember coming home on cold days and sitting atop the floor heater...right by the bookcase. Letting my skirt fill up with warm air and paging thru those books.

I've gotten rid of a lot of books and probably could stand to do some more weeding. I have books I've never read that I've had for years. The goal is to give them a try and if they suck give them away to a thrift store. I'm trying to only keep books I will reread and a few childhood faves.

I've had lots of fun with www.bookcrossing.com. I live in a tourist mecca so I put them in hostels, laundromats, coffee places, etc. It's been interesting to see where they end up.

Chemotherapy patients could use your books. Talk about a good cause!

And here's a list of 10 ways to find new homes for your books, some of which have already been mentioned, but many of which have not.

Thanks, Sciencegeek! I am also unrepentant about loving books. Between us, my boyfriend and I have about two and a half thousand in our one-bedroom apartment. We read them, reread them, consult them, and loan them to friends. I also find them beautiful.

We host a September book swap for friends, too, which means that not only do we weed annually, we get an influx of free books every fall. After the swap, all the leftovers are donated to Housing Works, a NYC charity that helps people living with AIDS.

Bramasoleiowa, my son worked in a second hand book shop
if you want to sell his tip is take one or two at a time. People who brings boxes of books don't get the best price. Time consuming, I know, but maybe there is more than one book shop where you live.

Since when did books become "clutter"? I love the look of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. The problem is when people use BOOKshelves to display tchotchkes.

I want to see a picture of Miniature Dance Party's apartment. I hope there will be a diorama of miniature people having a dance party among all those books.

I would keep them all if I could, but my DH is also entitled to a say in what takes up all the room in our apartment. I am now in the process of figuring out the most ideal book system for storage and retention - I think it means a little book ledge going around the wall of each bedroom in place of the crown molding, up high, so that no one has to feel that they have to get rid of things they want to keep - mostly books.

For me there is no such thing as too many books. Sorry.

Having been a research scholar and thereby churned through appalling amounts of books needed for specific projects over the years:

(1) Unless you read little other than bestsellers or have a really excellent university library card, it's a myth that you can get everything you need from the library. The library never has the right volume of Foucault in dual English-French pagination, and Foucault is a lot funnier in French. Also, the library is not open at 4 a.m. when you have a bad cold and can't sleep.

(2) Conversely, there's nothing magically wonderful about the mere act of being a book. It's a method of conveying information -- and really, a rather clunky method. I keep books that I'm using or expect to use, but I've become utterly heartless about reselling books that have ceased to have a function for me. And Project Gutenberg makes it so wonderfully easy to actually look at issues like how Charles Dickens' Christmas Carol was influenced by Washington Irving's Old Christmas & Bracebridge Hall.

If it strikes people as uneducated that there are very few books on my shelves other than ones where I or one of my friends contributed a chapter... well, that's their problem.

My books have taken over my house, yet I find it impossible to part with any of them.

I don't know how many books I have, but to give you an idea of the scale, I have six of the tallest Billy bookcases from Ikea and three of them have the additional extender shelf. They are all full.

I also have a library card at the local university and I use it extensively.

I do like coming into people's apartments and looking at their books - not a judgment thing, I just like seeing what other people read.

If you have lots of time to redistribute your books giving them away to friends is rewarding. My husband and I did this the last time we moved and everyone was thrilled to get an unexpected gift. We did still donate a box of books that didn't have obvious new homes to housing works, but felt really good about the connections we made by distributing our books personally as well.

Books are tools, and just like any other tool - if you dont use it you shouldnt feel bad about giving it to someone who will. I'm a tad frivolous with Amazon (and those Cambridge/Somerville bookstores) at times. However, I have no qualms about scouring through the shelves and yanking anything I havent read/picked up in a while. Thus, what remains are the books that I find most useful for various purposes: Art/history/theory/how-to books, philosophy, design reference, and those fiction books that I read and re-read. Anything else comes and goes.

And my bf is the cutest Johnnie ever :)

Hmmm. I wonder if your bf is "Barrett". He is the young man in this recent St. John's College recruitment video. He asks many good questions, don't you think? Now I understand why so many Johnnies want to keep their Great Books.

http://tinyurl.com/37y5xt

I swap books om www.paperbackswap.com. You can seap with other members and all you pay is shipping.

My problem is signed books. My father got all of us in the family started on giving autographed books as gifts years ago. So, I pick them up whenever I get a chance.

I know I really need to start selling them, but to a certain extent, I see them both as gifts and assets.

My solution to crowded bookshelves is to buy more shelving.

Eventually I also bought a bigger apartment.

Personally, I would de-clutter other aspects of my life before thinning down my library. My books are probably my most treasured possessions (next to my tulip chairs of course).

Ha! It took me almost 5 years to realize I was never going to consult my 17th century Dutch art book from art history. Once I accepted it, I was able to purge quite a few books. I think I might have to purge again. I think when it comes to books, it helps to do it in several steps.

200 books is what--a standard bookshelf full of books? As much space as a wide-screen TV and "media center"?

What is wrong with the world?

Now, when you get to have a couple thousand books, maybe you should talk about decluttering.

I have never viewed books as clutter. I am, however, facing a daunting problem: downsizing from a 2200 sq ft house to an 800 sq ft condo. I've already donated about 1500-2000 books to various libraries and I still have 125 linear feet of bookshelves. Maybe I could just put plywood over some of them for a "platform" bed???