Here is the final excerpt from the new book that comes out on March 28th. You can check out the central book post here to find other excerpts as well as all the info.
Letting Go of the Past, Embracing the Future
Fifteen years ago my Aunt Eleanor, told us she was preparing for her death. “Hold on!” I thought at the time, “What is this morbid plan, and what is she up to?” Strangely, this announcement did not have to do with the usual reasons, sickness, old age or loneliness. It had to do with too many books.
Eleanor’s library was remarkable. The biggest in the family, it was a combination of my grandmother’s books and her own, it easily filled 100 boxes.
However, she had moved a number of times recently and had come to look on her most prized possession – her library – as her biggest burden. It was the heaviest thing she owned and the most expensive to move. After this last move, she decided it was too much. Holding on to all these books was doing more harm than good. It was time to give away her library.
Initally pained by the thought, Eleanor had come to sees letting go of her books as an opportunity to come to terms with the first part of her life and prepare for the rest. She was not morbid about it; she was excited. She was eager to be free from all the weight and burden that she had created and carried around for her first sixty years.
First, she took out her most essential books, those that formed the DNA of her library and those which she would keep. She limited herself to one box. Then she gave small selections to every member of our family, before inviting close friends to come over and take a book for themselves. The rest of the collection was given to her local library.
Giving away the books was just the beginning. Eleanor also decided to clear away all the emotional clutter with friends and family. Over the next year, she had a number of intense and gratifying conversations with her children, ex-husband and other family members. She also met with close friends and spoke truthfully with them. To finish, she straightened out her business affairs, and sold off investments that had been languishing for some time.
Having made these changes, Eleanor’s life entered into a new phase. She was happier and more active than ever. And her discovery and the powerful act of giving away her possessions, made me look at my life differently at a much younger age.
Today, I love books, but I keep my collection small, and regularly work at editing my shelves. Due to Eleanor, I learned that we don’t need books as much as we need what is in them: their inspiration for the future.
I suppose we should make room for your new book on our shelves.
After moving several times with so many books, I learned to purge on a regular basis (does that make me a biblio-bulemic?)
The purges feel good. Of course, there is the occasional "what happened to that great book" moment, but it is nice to have a very specific allocation of shelf space for my books and special items.
I ... am ... a ... book ... junkie.
It's embedded in my cutural dna. Just thinking about culling makes me incredibly nervous. And I'm about to do what ultimately sparked Aunt Eleanor's liberation, move the multitude of boxes from one place to another.
The best bookshelves ever are the ones at your public library. You don't have all those books cluttering your home, yet you have access to all the books your little heart desires.
Instead of buying books, donate to the library, and then utilize this valuable public institution.
And, if you want to see interesting design, check out the Seattle Public library! Click on my name for photos.
Wow, are books a flash point for emotions!
The way I (try to) see it is that the question isn't "books?" or "art?" or "kitchen equipment?" but rather, "Has having this stuff reached the point where the burden of buying it, storing it, caring for it, and paying for space for it outweighs the pleasure in using it and/or looking at it?"
Where I get snarky is when people try to set one-size-fits-all rules for how much is enough. An undercounter fridge may be great for people who grab two meals' worth of supplies at the local farmer's market every afternoon. It won't cut it if you fill the freezer with staples from the supermarket or Costco -- nor if you freeze your own garden produce.
Aunt Eleanor's story, I like, because she was confronting what her immense library meant to *her* -- not trying to meet an externally set limit.
Oh, and just to snark a little -- if you have specialized research needs, the public library is typically useless. Even academic libraries may not be a substitute for owning your own.
I am currently getting rid of most of my books. It's easier for me than most, because after you've tossed in a dumpster 1,000 or so volumes from a law library at work you lose a lot of reverence. I finally hit a point where I realized that I was not the archivist for the world and that I would probably not have time over the next 10+ years to read all the material I have stockpiled.
Wonderful story...I too, am a book junkie. As an ex English major, I think I read ( or attempted) to read my weight in books, and when it came time to move to my new apartment, my stacks of books were the hardest to move.
I've since cleared things out and given some away with some attempt at a disciplined bookshelf, though i do love seeing books that are well loved and well read on my shelves, some of them need to be passed on and shouldn't be hoarded.
It is only in the wealthy houses and in the USA I saw libraries in houses.
It is not the number of books that you read that matter, it is how you analyze them that matters.
I read this some where:
Half of the books that are written are not published.
Half of the books that are published are not sold
Half of the books that are sold are not read
Half of the books that are read are not understood
Half of the books that are understood are misunderstood
Wende in SF: ditto.
Why would I try to get rid of my past?
It is MY past, MY history, something that transformed me to what I am. If anything, I regret having lost a lot of my books, furniture, photos (friends,family&) over the years.
"...observing the book of my life in disgust
I shudder and I curse,
I bitterly complain and weep in grief
but I don't erase a single sad line" (A.S.Pushkin)
You can read further what I think of my books clicking on my name
My apartment building has a lovely little anonymous system for dealing with books. Some of us, no idea how many, leave books we're done with on the entranceway table. Someone picks them up. You often see the book a few weeks later, then it gets picked up again... This, is a good way of not accumulating books (and not having to buy them!). Of course, it won't work for a big purge, but it's surprising how quickly a pile of 10-20 books on even esoteric subjects disappear in a large-ish building.
Maxwell:
Will you have an online version of your book in a pdf format. This way I could gift it to friends across the border.
Ang, that's the system in my building for paperback bestsellers and magazines, too.
I wonder how much of the book debate is because one faction assumes that "books" are current fiction and non-fiction, while the other faction is stocked up on books that it takes years of haunting used-book stores to find. I know my husband holds onto some of his massive collection because the potential effort to replace them would be so immense.
tape,
re: wealthy and their books.
Not true.
I had a chance to visit-and design - for some wealthy people (mostly through work),and they vary, as much as Fri-to-Fri people do. I recall one particularly niceapartment, overlooking Central Park, on two levels, with atrium of a living room and bedrooms/baths/dressing in the mezzanine surrounding it. The architectI worked for at the time design gorgeous full wall height pewter-stained bookcase for this client...which the client later used to display his MidWest figurines on... 3 books total.
And one of my friends, a freelance copyeditor, who couldn't afford NY and moved to MA, lives on a tiny budget-and has a library fit into 2 rooms.
People have priorities.
I stopped buying books like they were candy in my early 20s after realizing the money I spend on them and that I mostly don't reread them. I now only buy books I cannot find at the library or feel I will very likely use time and time again.
But I guess we're all "packrats" in some aspect of our lives. I would find it hard to part with some of my pictures or music.
Also the library isn't conducive to wee hour reference, inspiration or just plain reading with a cup of tea, a kitty on one's lap and the bathroom a crawl away. And in bed. Reading in bed. Can't do that at the library.
Also having many wonderful books I love to dazzle and entertain my friends when they come over. Or just let them entertain themselves. A house without books seems so bare and boring to me.
But a lot can be said to counter the above, I'll grant. I am a book junkie, after all. Justification is my prowess.
Wow, I can totally relate w/ Atomic Librarian. The addiction is to information gathering and collecting (a Gemini trait, btw, so I am). Another layer is the disseminating part and I'm afraid that I tend to forget EVERYTHING unless periodically reminded.
That's what the books do. They remind me of what I already know, have experienced, need to undertake. I have a crappy memory.
As per the Pushkin quote, that's my cultural dna, Russians are notorious book hoarders, collectors, ingestors. Tat, your journal entry is spot on. Word. My grandma taught me to read when I was 3, supposedly. Or was it her friend, another excellent but suppressed writer in the Writer's House in Moscow in the early 70's. The apt was CRAMMED with books in those glass-covered solid wood bookcases. Her husband was a writer. They incarcerated him because he wrote. It didn't end well.
wow! Thanks for the memory. Books ARE emotional.
Ang,
The new apt building I'm heading to has a similar book exchange system it seems and many times there are Russian books in heavy grey binders. I think I'll start to cull a bit by stocking a library in the Philipines a friend of mine is building. For the children. And as weaning.
Funny - I just sold a bunch of books to Powells and have store credit burning a hole in my pocket.
Former book junkie, now card-carrying library user. When I realized I read most of my books only once (unlike CDs that I listen to 100s of times), I stopped buying and started borrowing. At the time it was done for financial reasons, not space limitations.
Now my book buying focuses on reference-y books (cookbooks, art, music, plants, etc), paperback novels for travel companions (and I purge those annually), and very deliberately selected books of poetry and fiction. If a book borrowed from a library makes a particularly strong and lasting impression on me I will buy it to have and to hold. I think I only made 4 such purchases in 2005.
But I feel a little conflicted as an enthusiastic reader because I want bookstores to stay in business and writers to get royalties - but I don't help the cause when I rely on the library for 95% of my reading material.
i love my books. i moved cross country with them so i better adore them. well before i moved though i did a purge. i gave away novels, cookbooks, VHS etc. to a non profit that helped low income families where i volunteered. their 'free to take' library was pretty bare. it hit me how much money i have spent to just have stuff collecting dust. it didn't cure me though. my collection is still great and growing, but now i do a purge twice a year to give away or sale.
the library will never have everything i need at my fingertips. some books are completely out of print. i will never part with my art, history or cookbooks. they are a constant inspiration.
i had a pretty extensive library in my parents' old house, even years after i had moved across the country. when they followed me about two years ago, i went home to pack up my old bedroom and "stuff." my mom told me i could only store two small boxes in their new house, so i'd better get rid of all of my books. it was sooooo painful and hard to chose which ones to sell, give away, donate, and i was really angry with my parents for moving and forcing me to do this... but now, i realize that my mom was right- i don't miss any of them. i kept the books that i love and reread, and i've only bought a few books that i owned and "needed" a copy of. so i guess she cured me of my book hoarding. thanks mom.
The book issue strikes a chord--my father grew up in a small house dominated by bookshelves and I think my father has kept every book he ever owned--although his current house with built-in bookshelves can only sustain a portion of them. I believe his collection still includes all the physics textbooks he used as an undergrad in the sixties. He visited me last week and asked me if I wanted any books when he was gone. As a literature major, I too had scads of books, but in the last five years have decided I would keep books only if they were useful or evoked a feeling in me that made their inclusion on my shelf worthwhile. I was happy to tell Dad that I had a few treasured books from childhood and that was enough for me. He looked relieved; my younger sister and budding writer insisted she wants all of them. I feel relieved that I have moved out of my father's romanticism of books for their own sake (although I'll visit my public library as long as we have them!). And I wish for my still-in-college sister's sake that my father could edit his collection so that she would not be in possession of hundreds of boxes of books. But I don't think he can--they represent a philosophy he doesn't want to leave behind. I'll be interested to see what my sister does with them . . .
Books become things - just like packrats do when it becomes a emotional baggage.
I posted on a previous thread on books that I (former literature major too) don't have much attachment to books per se and see a lot of my past book-holding (and moving books from place to place) as so much clutter. I clear out books very regularly now. In this bad library city -- DC -- I tend to buy used books at my favorite store a few blocks away, although sometimes I can't find or can't wait for a particular book and will buy it new. Then, when I'm done with them, I sell them back to the store for credit on more books, and the cycle starts again. I hold on to reference books and other books that have some sentimental attachment - such as a book from childhood. Also, something that's rare and meaningful to me, such as an art book by Yoko Ono from college that a friend gave to me(I assume it's rare.) Sometimes I will keep a book just to look back at clever or remarkable language, but the truth is, I hardly ever look at these.
A couple of actions that I've noticed help keep me from buying books that I never read are:
1-In Amazon, I put books into my shopping cart or wish list. As far as I know, these books will stay there indefinitely. So, I can keep track of things I'm interested in but not buy things on a whim. I only end up buying a fraction of the books and may get them used. Just putting something in the cart satisfies some urge.
2-I keep a list of books that I want in my PDA. When I'm at the used bookstore, I always have that to aid in searching for books.
When the subject comes to books I am reminded of the house I grew up in. There was a walk in closet with bookshelves. If I ever own my own home I am damn sure going to have one of those. Books are going to accumulate no matter what and it sure is nice to have quick easy access to them. I hate having to go rifling through a box to find a book at the bottom.
I buy copies of special books I *already* have, especially if they are out of print and available at a yard sale or secondhand place.
I'll have a spare if one wears out or the cats chew/shred it. And, best of all, I can give them away!
thanks for sharing maxwell, it's about letting go or being able to let go and start anew, moving foward.
When I moved to this country - I gave away all my books, reference material, which was around 120 lbs. I donated to charity, threw away a lot of junk and I was left with 3 books which I still find very helpfull.
I have moved around 10-12 times in the last 7 years. I have to keep giving away stuff in order to move forward and It helps.
Generally, with contemporary fiction and non-fiction, I tend to pass the books along to friend or relative--or just leave a small pile by the dumpster in my building (for someone else to adopt). I'll hold onto books from certain authors or those with wacky camp value. With cookbooks, I try to weed them out every few years... I only hold onto art/photography/design coffee table books or books that have been signed. But even this category is getting unweildly for my tastes. I often go online to see the going prices for out-of-print books in my collection and am almost tempted to drop them off at Arkana Books in Santa Monica for resale. (Almost--because I always stop short.) I hope one day to get rid of all of these... Baby steps, I guess.
I appreciate the sentiment of looking forward and clearing space, but I truly view my books as more of a luxury than the space they take up.
Having books to lend to friends (and borrowing books in kind!) is something I cherish, and not something I want to change about my life.
Pixie writes: "In this bad library city -- DC -- I tend to buy used books at my favorite store a few blocks away..." DC a bad library city?? Good Lord, you've got the mother of all libraries there, the Library of Congress. I've borrowed books from there through my local library and I live in *Michigan.*
Okay, I live on Capitol Hill and my friend works at the Library of Congress....you can't just walk in and borrow from it...they do interlibrary loan, but there are restrictions, too--and that isn't exactly easy. I agree with Pixie. Shhhh, don't tell anyone, but I still borrow from the public library in maryland where I used to live and still work!
I'm a bibliophile, too. But, during my last move, I eliminated via donation, gift to family and friends, and selling, about 100 books. It was emotional at times, and I did save a lot...but it was revealing. I realized I was hanging on to them more for what I thought they said about me...as symbols of periods of my life, of my interests, of my knowledge. I was using my bookshelves as a method of saying something about myself. This is fine, as long as you realize this and accept it. But, I also realized that a lot of the titles I was hanging on to, I didn't even appreciate all that much...in essence, they didn't say anything about who I was NOW, and weren't even aesthetically pleasing...basically, there was no purpose to them for me anymore. I still have a substantial amount of books. But, I'm much more careful to resell things like paperback novels that i mainly have bought for entertainment. I can't imagine my life without books, but I really feel lighter now that I have focused on those I like the most or need the most.
Statimque, ut pecuniam accpero, Graecus primum autores, deinde vestes emam. (The first thing I shall do, as soon as the money arrives, is to buy some Greek authors; after that, I shall buy clothes.) Last week I used that quote from Erasmus on the occasion of my wife's 51st birthday, when I gave her four reference books on the Irish language from the early 1800's.
For some of us, our libraries form a core part of our sense of self. My wife and I regularly prune our books, but, as academics, our core collection of essential books would easily take up more than a 100 boxes.
As to the idea that you can always use your local reference library, we have found that, over the years, we have books that are dear to us that aren't available anywhere else within reach.
Maxwell's story is a touching one, but one must find one's own path in life.
Christine in DC--That's exactly how I feel. Thank you for explaining it so well. As I am putting books up for sale it is an evaluation of who I am now. And part of that is the drama geek, the short shory reader, the classic fiction reader. But not wholly.
The Washington Post Home section today focuses on home libraries. Check it out:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/22/AR2006032200557.html
No, no, no. There's just no way we'd ever get rid of our books. We've ripped out our fireplace to make room for the books. If I had to, I'd rip out a kitchen to make room for books.
They're not just possessions: books are ideas, memories, histories. I re-read them, reinterpret them. A good book is a constant intellectual challenge. My partner and I can trace our relationship through our books: we met in a bookstore. The first gift he gave me was a book. Our first dates were spent exploring our favorite bookstores. Of course we occasionally edit, but that's to replace paperbacks with hardbacks or to get rid of books we were obligated to buy (i.e. school books). But we'd both have to go insane before seriously considering cutting down our library.
No, no, no, no! I can't express just how awful the thought of getting rid of our books is to me!
Virginia--calm down and take a deep breath...I think as others have said, you don't have to! :) I think everything said here should be taken with a grain of salt, because it's all about deciding what is important to YOU, as Wende said so eloquently earlier. For me, it was about deciding what was important. It felt great to finally dismiss some of those things I was holding onto for no particular reason except for a "pack rat" kind of feeling--a desperate "I cannot get rid of this copy of "Shakespeare's Bawdy" that I last read 10 years ago in my college Shakespeare class because I "might need it" or "it completes my Shakespeare reference section." sort of thing. I realized that wasn't important to me anymore (though, I may actually still own that particular book...can't remember if that was one I was able to set free!). I feel very similarly about books, actually--but found it liberating to realize I could, if I wanted to, let go of some of them without vacating the core of my being and the core of my library, even. There are books--like my copy of Ulysses that I had for a class and still has a taped email from my best friend at the time inside the cover or my "signet paperback" version of Pride and Prejudice bought in high school--that I cannot let go of. And, I have, in fact, added books since getting rid of those 100 some books--but they're ones that are important to me now.
Another DC Christine! What are the chances?! (kidding, of course...) I should have made up a clever little screen name...
Christine,
Intellectually, I do recognize that! It's just even the thought of someone giving up books gives me the willies...
This really points up how differently people feel about their possessions. I really, really have no big thing about giving up run-of-the-mill books. I like the idea of a stream of books constantly coursing through my life, rather than the drudgery of having to house them. I like to feel free to give books away that I have liked and think others would like, without needing them back; and others will give me books too. I like to allow the bookstore or the library (not in DC though) to mind my books until I need them, when I'll go down and get them, either with cash, credit, or a library card. I'll certainly keep the special books. And the reference books that I keep are like tools. And some of those are being gradually replaced by the internet, or, in the case of my two-volume dictionary I've had since I was 14, mostly replaced, but not completely, since they are so handy when I'm reading in the bedroom, away from the computer.
It's so interesting and thrilling to me that people feel so deeply about their books.
It's kind of a tradition in my family to give away books. At the huge Christmas party my aunt and uncle used to throw every year, everybody who came received a book, even the roommates and friends I used to bring at the last minute. My uncle put a lot of care into who received what and at least half of the books would be from his own collection, the other half bought new.
My father will typically press a book into my or anyone else's hands as I'm leaving his house and say "You have to read this!".
We recently got rid of six boxes of books. We still have at least four hundred, and most of those I'm pretty sure we won't ever part with -- they're the ones I want to go back and reread or have around for my son to explore should he ever happen upon them on the shelf. I let go of whatever I did not feel that way about.
The exchange of ideas with people you care about, and making room for new ideas, is exciting to me, as being surrounded with all the knowledge you've accumulated can be exciting to others.
I used to borrow personal reading matter from the LC when I was a Hill staffer. If you are not staff, you can register as a reader, have things held, but there is no borrowing except via interlibrary loan, which can take a long time.
I'm in an online forum that's reading David Allen's Getting Things Done. In this city of overachievers and workaholics, there is not one single copy in the DCPL. A lot of stuff gets stolen.
Actually, DCPL used to be one of the better city agencies.
I'm a librarian and even I never buy books. I save myself a lot of money that way.
IMHO: Whenever I see a photo of a living room, whether it's in a magazine or book, or on this site, or wherever, and it doesn't have a single book in it, I always think something's wrong. It's hard for me to imagine such a room without books in it.
I've been able to purge my collection annually, and I constantly check out books from the library -- yet I still cannot imagine paring my books down to the point that I wouldn't have a few bookcases full of them. I love to go back and re-read or just peruse old chestnuts. I don't think of them as identifiers of me and my past; I just truly enjoy what is in them.
When my mother became a librarian, she stopped seeing books as something sacred, and not only got rid of a lot of her books at home, but also stopped buying new ones, except as presents for my father, which then got donated to her library, after he read them. That said, I don't think there's one right way to handle books in the home. If you have a lot and and you like them and they're not in your way, there's no problem. On the other hand, if you decide to get rid of many, that's not a sin, either.
There's another aspect to personal libraries though: Sometimes the books are there for other people to read. I grew up in a house full of books, and I remember going through the shelves, finding treasures I wouldn't necessarily have fallen upon at the library (too many trees!). I still love to read one of the many crime novels in the upstairs bedroom when I'm visiting.
I love to lend people books, too - the way to my heart is definitely through the bookshelf. And I love the discussions that can come out of reading titles in other people's collections ("oh you've got that one too? It's so good isn't it?"). That said, there are books on my shelves that I wouldn't miss, the bad books (not the good bad books, I like those) for instance. It could do with a bit of weeding. But the books I love will never be clutter to me...
i strongly agree with the article. i had cancer a few years ago at the age of 40 and it was quite and eye opening experince. It also prompted a move that meant getting rid of alkot of things I had been holding onto. i ended up giving away furniture that was easier then trying to sell it and i gave it to various friends and relative whom I knew were in need of it or would put it to good use. Now I find it easier to keep things simple and know that to many things can be overwhelming and although they may hold memories the memoried do no go away because the items dit
Holding on to THINGS that represent the past is lovely. Holding on to MEMORIES is even lovlier. A dear, dear friend of mine spent 20 years of her life in the Marine Corps, 15 years in a romantic relationship and 4 years in college. She has boxes and boxes of Maine Corps papers and books (all of which are outdated), she has enough furniture to fill a two bedroom house and about 10 boxes of things that remind her of her college days. She lives in an 800 sq ft flat which means all of these things are in storage for which she has paid $150 a month fo the past three years. Despite my best attempts she cannot let go of these material THINGS. There comes a time when we all just have to let go.....
We came to the USA with our three young children in 1982, and two havy luggages filled with our most cherished books we saved till now.
i've been thinking a lot about purging my cd collection. this would have been absolutely unthinkable until recently. but with the advent of digital music, and the fact that most of the time the discs just dust alphabetically orderd dust collectors, i've been thinking a lot about pruning. it just seems silly to have them all displayed along the wall. what statement do i find it so neccessary to make? why is so much of my identity wrapped up in my odd taste in music? it doesn't have to be. maybe it's because i'm so visual. i'm afraid that if can't see them all the time, i'll start to forget abou them. but would that be such a bad thing?
Hi peoples. Over the past year, I have been in the process of decluttering my CD and book collection. I'm afraid to go out all (burn CDS to digital and sell all and just get rid of ALL my books). I'm worried that when people visit my place and see no clutter, no CDs or books on shelves they will think Im soul-less and boring. Am I stupid to think this way?
i am a ph.d student and try only to own primary texts (i study literature) and books that i know i'll refer to again and again (actually, a book that i love and look at all the time is called 'Living with books'!)
but: magazines are the killer, because you can't access them again once they're gone... i treasure my (yes, i'm admitting it) martha stewarts and my dominos, etc etc: what to do about these? how to access the information in them? how to organize and file the material in a useful and aesthetic way? a bunch of files is really not that appealing...
Most people consume books like any other product: they read them once, maybe twice if they like it a lot, and then happily pass it on. That is a totally fine way to be.
For some of us, though, books -- and by that I mean the experience of reading and sometimes even books as objects -- aren't acquired and read with the normal consumer mindset. That may sound snobby, but I don't mean it that way.
It's just that for some people, books are as necessary in a home as chairs and beds, as light coming through the windows. Books aren't "decorating accents" or a shorthand way to show how smart you think you are.
For some of us, books are extensions of ourselves, of what we love best and value most -- of course we make room for them in our homes.
Do you know what makes me smile? That we, all of us here debating and having opinions, live in a time and place where the _problem_ is too many books!
I find that very heartening.
And as for my books, some I donate, some I keep and
if having a collection of books that is a teensy bit out of control is my worst problem , then I am more than content.
I grew up poor and so most of my books as a child came from the librart. I had 12 linear feet of bookshelf in my room, and I didn't fill it until I went away to college.
There were a LOT of problems with this. Many books that I adored as a child are now out of print and have been culled from library shelves, and so I can't share them with my son. Many books that I want to reread I just can't FIND. And a number of books I can't remember the name of!
Now I'm making a decent living...as a professional novelist. *g* And one of the things I love most about having money is being to BUY BOOKS. 8 years out of high school, I now have 120 linear shelves of booksm and I love them all because I keep ponly those that are special.
I buy for several reasons. First, the local library is beyond appalling. Second, I need my research materials for extended periods of time. Third, I want writers I like to keep writing--and the ONLY way to ensure that is to buy their books new. Fourth, books make a house feel like home. Fifth, I reread. Sixth, I want to leave fabulous books for my children the way my grandparents left them for me.
I don't allow myself to accumulate large numbers of "to be read" books. If I start to get too many, I stop buying.
When I read a book, it immediately goes into one of three piles: 1) keep, 2) give to friends, 3) sell at the UBS. Keepers are for classics, for books good enough to reread, and for books that I will consult with in the future. "Give to friends" are for books that I don't love but that someone I know might. Everything else goes to the UBS.
I'm fortunate that I'm living in a house and that my new one will have a 14x27' library. :-) Leather furniture...fireplace...(eventually) modern custom bookshelves...what could be better? If I didn't have the space, other things would go first. Including clothes. When I first from an apt to a house, I had more boxes of books than everything else COMBINED. And that was a good balance for me!
The bookshelves in the bedroom hold my A-listers--favorite writers(Florence King, Patrick Dennis, Rita Mae Brown, Betty MacDonald); some sentimental favorites; small categories like the collection of disaster science fiction. The shelves in the spare bedroom hold the secondary books that I want to hang onto but not have at my fingertips. They get culled periodically or maybe move up to the A list at times. These are the hardbacks.
Paperbacks usually get read and then passed on. One thing I found helpful is door shelves from the Container Store. They hold the paperbacks that I want to hang onto and being behind the door don't take up much room.
I have two quotes framed on the bookcases.
One is from Amanda Cross--"She had often noticed that when people with large libraries fall into trouble, the fact that the books had not risen en masse to help them always seemed to give those without books comfort."--Death in a Tenured Position.
The other from Fran Lebowitz--"Everything is disappointing to those who read a lot. There's no question that at no time in my life have I ever thought that life was as good as reading. . . . But I would rather read than have any kind of real life, like working, or being responsible."