Luc van Donkersgoed @donkersgoed@hachyderm.io
As I _once again_ bought more books than I can read over the holidays, I’m reminded of this viewpoint:
Think not of the books you’ve bought as a « to be read » pile. Instead, think of your bookcase as a wine cellar. You collect books to be read at the right time, the right place, and the right mood.
Drawing from [Nassim Nicholas] Eco’s example, [Nassim Nicholas] Taleb deduces:
Read books are far less valuable than unread ones. [Your] library should contain as much of what you do not know as your financial means, mortgage rates, and the currently tight real-estate market allows you to put there. You will accumulate more knowledge and more books as you grow older, and the growing number of unread books on the shelves will look at you menacingly. Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books. Let us call this collection of unread books an antilibrary. [Emphasis original]
Writing for the New York Times, Kevin Mims also doesn’t care for Taleb’s label […].
His preferred label is a loanword from Japan: tsundoku. Tsundoku is the Japanese word for the stack(s) of books you’ve purchased but haven’t read. Its morphology combines tsunde-oku (letting things pile up) and dokusho (reading books).
The word originated in the late 19th century as a satirical jab at teachers who owned books but didn’t read them. While that is opposite of Taleb’s point, today the word carries no stigma in Japanese culture. It’s also differs from bibliomania, which is the obsessive collecting of books for the sake of the collection, not their eventual reading.
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Camenzind, A. (2018). Maultiere machen Geschichte oder Suworows Krieg in den Schweizer Alpen im Jahre 1799. Cham, Verlag Pro Libro Luzern GmbH. | 2018 | Export RIS | |
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Kaufmann, K. (2023). Stollenluft – In den Kavernen der schweizerischen Vergangenheit. Mels, SL Druck + Medien. | https://www.stollenluft.ch/ | 2023 | Export RIS |
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Jorio, M. (2023). Die Schweiz und ihre Neutralität – Eine 400-jährige Geschichte. Zürich, Hier und Jetzt. | https://www.hierundjetzt.ch/de/catalogue/die-schweiz-und-ihre-neutralitat_2200044/ | 2023 | Export RIS |
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Spiegelman, A. (1996). The Complete Maus: A Survivor’s Tale. New York, Pantheon. | 1996 | Export RIS | |
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Gaddis, J. L. (2018). On grand strategy. London, Penguin Books. | 2018 | Export RIS | |
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King, A. (2019). Command : the Twenty-First-Century General. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. | https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108642941 | 2019 | Export RIS |
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Storr, J. (2022). Something Rotten : Land Command in the 21st Century. Havant, Howgate. | 2022 | Export RIS | |
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Freedman, L. (2022). Command – the Politics of Military Operations from Korea to Ukraine. London, Allen Lane. | https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/317543/command-by-freedman-lawrence/9780241456996 | 2022 | Export RIS |