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Underground > Books, Criticism & Writing >

Organizing your collection

15:54 / 04.03.04

I recently realized that I was buying multiple copies of the same comics because they were poorly organized (neatly but ineffeciently stacked in a box). I looked around and saw chaos everywhere -- cookbooks in the bedroom, art books under the stereo rack, novels on the ironing board. So I went out and bought two new large bookcases.

Now I have all the novels and poetry together, all the comics sleeved, in numerical order within the series, and in alphabetical order by first-listed writer's last name, excepting books of which I have only one issue, which are all together at the end. Separate sections for books: novels & poetry, reference, science, music, art, theory, 1st eds., essays & bios. No matter how I sort them, though, there's always a pile of miscellaneous left over. It bugs me so much I'm thinking of giving these books away.

Does anybody else even sort their books at all, and if so do you have any special way of doing it?

16:57 / 04.03.04

Half of my books are at my mother's right now, so I'm not even sure what I have in my apartment. I should take an inventory soon. Tangentally, my ex-girlfriend has sold almost $500 worth of books on Half.com in the last month.

17:49 / 04.03.04

I just try to keep comics by the same author together, so on my shelves where I keep my trade paperbacks there's a Grant Morrison section, an Alan Moore section, etc. (Individual comics get grouped together in the box likewise, by author, then series, then issue #.)

Regular books get grouped together by author and/or subject. Sometimes I feel that I have too many extraneous volumes, and then I round up the ones I'm no longer interested in and take them to a used bookstore for store credit, or donate them to the local prison book project so someone else can enjoy them.

18:39 / 04.03.04

I organise my books and everyone laughs hysterically at me when they see my bookcases, and calls me anally retentive. I organise them by genre or topic (like you) but also by author within the genre if they're novels and I have more than one book by the author. They're not quite alphabetical, but I am considering it...

And under reference I also collate them by topic, so all travel books go together, all books on design, all books on film making etc. The miscellaneous ones aren't miscellaneous really, just think of them as the beginning of a new section or topic tht you haven't collected enough of yet. ;-)

I tend to buy a lot of books, so now and then I have a big clear out of novels I am not likely to re-read, and I give them to charity. Then I buy lots more new books to fill the space up.

And cookbooks go in the kitchen, unless you have funny fetishes.

19:00 / 04.03.04

I organise them by genre or topic (like you) but also by author within the genre if they're novels and I have more than one book by the author.

Ha -- I didn't want to go into too much detail for fear of seeming freakish, but in fact the novels, for example, are not only alpha by author but also in order of original publication within author. Separate section for film also, I forgot that. Now that I look at the reference section, I realize that I have grouped all the true crime, all the language, and all the nature books together without even realizing it.

19:01 / 04.03.04

And what's funny about fetishizing photos of food? I thought that was (resisting vanilla joke) rather commonplace.

19:16 / 04.03.04

I didn't want to go into too much detail for fear of seeming freakish

I actually waited to reply to this thread, just to check that I wasn't the only one who did utterly pointless cross-referencing of genre and author! My novels (at least, the ones that fit in the bookcase) are organised by author, but the authors are organised by (actually, I am still ashamed to mention this) the date that they were first published, so I can imagine the whole thing is a timeline. Dreadful. Not that I want to change it now...

06:58 / 05.03.04

Surely the point of the whole exercise is feeling freakish, and liking it?

11:51 / 05.03.04

Yes yes. I don't like having things half-organised though - it has to be all or nothing, which is why my shelves at my parents' house are in such a chaotic state (not to mention the piles on the floor, like a hypocaust). If I had my heart's desire I'd have my own card-catalogue...

In the following order for preference (everything by author alphabetically, and within the author's section alphabetically by title): novels, essays, plays, poetry, miscellaneous literature, criticism, art history and criticism, history, mythology/religious history and theology, natural history, science, misc inc. humour, works of reference...

Large books are so pig irritating, aren't they? They just don't FIT...

12:27 / 05.03.04

Most of our books are still in boxes in the basement. There is a cherry-picked selection that's curently upstairs within easy reach, which consists of

(a) reference works
(b) works on spirituality
(c) comics TPBs and OGNs
(d) specific nonfiction (for current research)
(e) general fiction (frequently read/skimmed)
(f) sheet music / hymnals / songbooks

Those that are currently in rotation, I organize by height, because the shelves of my bookcase are uneven.

Beyond that, I can't get too anal-retentive, because I have an almost-two-year-old who loves nothing more than pulling books off their shelves: I re-shelf the entire collection once a day, at a minimum.

12:54 / 05.03.04

Books n CDs n Tapes n Videos n Comics: Randomly, really. By size on the shelf if it applies (books). I rely on visual memory to figure out what I've got and where it is. Generally works out okay, and the randomness means I can have things like the Satanic Verses next to Spice Girls books, or The Kingdom videos next to Batman cartoon videos. Which makes it more fun for people trying to judge me by my accumulated toys.

DVDs: vaguely themed, but I've only got about a couple of dozen, so no real pattern yet.

Magazines : I keep all my Fortean Timeses in box files in order, and writing mags the same way - others I just bin or tear out articles as I see fit.

Comic TPBs and OGNs : Shelves for Miller, Gaiman, Moore and Morrison, rest by series or character (Superman/Batman/whatever), with the odd diversion for size reasons (Calvin & Hobbes trasury size won't fit next to the others properly, for example).

Inconsistent, I realise, but horses for courses and all that...

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

14:31 / 05.03.04

I used to organise alphabetically by author. I tried doing it by subject, but the crossovers were driving me mad.

Then I worked in a bookshop where I had to order books for a living, and that put me off the whole idea. Now I let them roam free.

15:03 / 05.03.04

I'm currently re-organizing my books using mostly the Libarary of Congress system, putting anything not in the LOC in the subject section that seems most applicable. My GN's I'll probably put labels on like the rest of my books, but since so many will not be in the LOC I'll probably organize them alphabetically by writer name. My CD's & DVD's are ordered chaotically. I have something like 600+ books, so I needed something more "orderly" to keep my apartment from literary anarchy.

15:41 / 05.03.04

I have something like 600+ books...

Ah. A beginner, then.

17:57 / 05.03.04

Considering my age (24) and my relative lack of income, I'd say I'm holding my own. I'll probably break 1000 in 3 years, tops.

18:07 / 05.03.04

but the authors are organised by (actually, I am still ashamed to mention this) the date that they were first published, so I can imagine the whole thing is a timeline

GASP! What a brilliant fucking idea. Why didn't I think of this. Now I have an excuse to re-shelve everything. Which was, I think, my secret ambition for this thread.

Kit-kat club: I agree about the problem with large books. Chris Ware is a major culprit -- half is stuff is tiny and the other half huge.

I must say, these cheap cases I bought at IKEA have rather nicely-spaced shelves. Just the right size for LPs, which is good for all but the very tallest large books as well, and they're made of wood rather than fiberboard, which is nice.

Don't feel bad, J Mellot, I'm 32 and still at or under a thousand after the recent clearing-out.

21:20 / 05.03.04

Wasn't a dig, J--just a would-be wry comment on my own proclivity for accumulating huge masses of the bastards. Like fred, I carry out periodic purges, and I'm still dreading the eventual move from this apartment to our next place.

Here's to a long and fruitful career as a bibliophile.

00:37 / 07.04.04

kit-kat club: what's a hypocaust? Less-than a holocaust?

06:57 / 07.04.04

A hypocaust is, I believe (though I haven't checked this before replying so might well be wrong, curses curses), a Roman central heating system, part of which consists of stacks of bricks or tiles underneath the floor - presumably functioning as a sort of storage heating.

Actually I have now checked and have found a diagram:

16:08 / 09.04.04

Interesting, thank you.

19:38 / 09.04.04

speaking of anal retentive - i work in a library so i not only organize my own books, but i spend all day organizing other people's books!

i'm wondering does anyone else have an evil imp (or as i suspect in my case, girlfriend) who finds it amusing to wait until you've completely reshelved your entire collection and then randomly pull twenty or thirty volumes out and leave them all over the floor (presumably to see if you'll put them back in their proper place)?

07:07 / 17.04.04

Books are split into fiction and non-fiction. Fiction alphabetised by author, non-fiction split into topics - plays, poetry, philosophy, science, travel, cookery, art etc etc. Some categories have sub-categories - eg travel has actual travel guides, maps, travelogues etc. I feel less of a freak having read this thread.

18:24 / 18.04.04

I use a book database with every book that passes through my hands recorded on it - including library books. I keyword them, add in a chunk of the blurb, add any references to websites where either I or another person has talked about them, and list where I've got them stored (eg. "Parent's Home", "Flat" etc.) or the library where I found them (with Dewey code - yes, I know, you don't even have to say it). They are also categorised in to neat categories based on where I've used them in writing (listing the names of pieces and their status etc.). And, yes, this dorky reference system includes fiction. Alas, it is still incomplete, but extremely useful as it allows me to think: "Ah, I read some book from the library about evolutionary biology six months ago", and can jump straight to it. I'd like it even more if it could query the local libraries and bookshops and tell me whether it's in stock or not, but that's rather wishful thinking considering how I have difficulty getting them to acknowledge the existence of a title when asked in English, let alone XML-RPC.