Evening star., 1947-06-28
This and That
By Charles E. TraceWeN.

Getting rid of surplus books is always a
heart-breaking task to the booklover. He finds,
after hours sampling them he wants to keep
them all.
Fortunate is he. then, If he has an attic big
enough to hold the leftovers. This is fine
place for the physical thing known as a book.
It is above the moisture line Books kept there
will not mildeW, nor will the covers bow up.
They add a new dimension to place often
disregarded In time the attic comes to be a
sought-after place, as the demand comes up
for this book or that one.
Time as it does elsewhere, shows the futility
of book judgments. The attic attests the same.
book regarded as not worth keeping-but put
in the attic shelves-is found some day to be
the very one and only.
Like disregarded persons, such books may
come into their own at last.
Theodore Dreser's "Sster Carrie" was
printed 1000 copies, in its frst-and for long
time its laSt-edition.
About 400 copies were purchased, and 100
given away to reviewers. The rest remained
in storage.
Today the book is in wide demand.
The books in the attic have a somewhat
similar history It may be that time will never,
in their cases, do marvellous things for them.
Still, they will be there, waiting the demand,
The demand for book of any sort is not
constant, except in the comparative short life
Bible.
Most books have fuctuating demands. This
occurs in the life of every reader At one stage
in his progress through the world Charles
Dickens was must" Or, if he comes along
later Scott Fitzgerald. Time brought him new
books and new tastes but the old lovers are
always there ready to be taken out, brushed
off, and read again. Not all old lovers are so
easily handled. The boy in the = man still
stands puzzled over the spinning tops of the
old days Something in him wants to spin
the thing, and something else in him tells him
not to do it.
With books it is much the same way, except
that any reader can go back to the old loves
and thoroughly enjoy them again. To do it.,
he must put himself into the actual mood
of the old days at least to the extent of doing
what was necessary then-reading. Read
ing is not always easy. 1t takes some deter
mination to reread an old one. Here is
Rabbit" 1t was good story then-and it
is a good story now Read that part about
the sunrise, and get the feel of an old master
piece come to life again.
The attic place is ringed around with plain
bookcases, unpainted They do as well as any,
and go better with the unfinished beams Of
the roof The books look nice there. The soul
of the friend of books is pleased that the
hundreds of volumes are not lying as they
might have been from anothers hand. on some
damp bookstore outside table He sees them,
as they might have been. with large placard,
rs cents" it says; he sees the greasy, questing
hands going over the pages, and he shrinks
from the contact, as if he were the book him
self 1t is impossible to think of his books as
being there-he laughs pleasantly to himself,
to realize that they are not there, but here,
safe from impudent hands. 1t makes no diff
ference whether the book is good or not SO
good 1t was his book For some reason. then,
he picked it, and brought it home; now he must
stick up for it. That is why all his old books
are here. safe from wet and dust. That is
another of the good points of the attic storage,
Very little dust gets this high.
Here in the attic they perch, like. birds on
tree branches. like nestlings kept warm by
their parents bodies. Books are birds, free
and wild. No one, not even their author,
knows exactly what they will do. or how far
they will go, when the roaring presses release
them. They go on the winds. in showers, into
the minds and hearts of men. They soar
through the world. bringing happiness, some
times misery. because not even those who loved
them best felt sure of them. Their fate is the
fate of man. seeking testing, sometimes tri-
umphing, sometimes failing. often feeling sure,
but sometimes in doubt. A man or book is
that way.