Sam Brown

#451 8th January 2012 at 4pm Notes 1 Comment

Throughout my life, I consider the books that sit untouched on my shelf, bought but not read. Some sit for years before I pull them down and crack the glue. I purchase them sensing the value within. But when they appear at my doorstep, and I leaf through the pages, I see that I’m not yet prepared to glean their secrets or even know where in the rows of text to search.

I can relate to this wonderful thought from Alex Charchar’s article in the second edition of The Manual. Over the years I have managed to collate quite the collection of books and a quick survey suggests 75% of them have remained uncracked, many still confined within the shrink wrap they arrived in.

I buy many kinds of books, technical, fictional, illustrative, inspirational, autobiographical. This year I plan to read more, my goal is 52. Perhaps not 1 per week, but if I could end the year having read north of 50 different titles I’d be happy.

This coincides nicely with my declaration of Instapaper bankruptcy. At the beginning of the year I culled my entire (160+) list of unread articles and started over. What a massively satisfying feeling.