Boys With Books

    Premium subscribers to this blog have noted that March has not come in as a lion, in terms of posts, and that there have been far less of them than centimeters of snow. I will attempt to pick up the pace rather than offer excuses (again), and provide you here with another post about libraries. Admittedly a rather anodyne subject, but that is not a bad thing these days.
     Boys are usually associated more with toys - things like Corvettes, Donzis and ATVs  - than books, lest they be deemed effete and bookish. Norman Mailer’s name is more likely to be seen nearer ‘machismo’ than either of the words just mentioned, but he had almost as many libraries (4) as he had wives (6). Although he collected books and spent over $1000 a month buying them, he could be rough with them. He was also tough on his wives, one of whom he stabbed. His last wife compared his books to Kudzu, which is a view shared by many others. Still, I think many of my fellow-readers wouldn’t mind resting in the room pictured below.

Norman Mailer’s Library

Norman Mailer’s home library, Brooklyn Heights, New York, 2011
© Lawrence Schiller, All Rights Reserved

Blokes With Books

     In the article discussing Mailer’s books and libraries it is mentioned that he admired the work of Colin Wilson. I am embarrassed to say that I have never read any of his many books, but do remember that he was an angry young man back in the sixties (weren’t we all). I also recall that I read an article fairly recently that said Wilson lived surrounded by books. Although size doesn’t matter, his collection contained about 30,000 while Mailer had only around 7,000. Although I couldn’t find a flattering photo of the abode in Gorran Haven where Wilson kept his books I did find some excellent descriptions by those who visited the place. Both are provided below.

Colin Wilson’s Home

     Although the setting above does look as inviting as the one in New York, you will agree, after reading these descriptions, that it would have been a fine place to visit

“He and Joy were able to offer (carefully vetted) guests smoked salmon and fine wine in their Cornwall hermitage, its rooms and sheds groaning with 30,000 books and 10,000 classical and jazz records. Wilson, still an unstoppably wide-ranging and oracular conversationalist, grew into a kind, mostly serene man.

“Arriving at the cottage we are welcomed by two black dogs, and although one is still a puppy, he is still quite large. There is also a parrot called Clovis who has a habit of chewing books. The Wilson’s house is crammed with books, records and videos, and we add to it when Colin arrives by handing him copies of Kenneth Grant’s poetry volume Convolulus. The house was called Tetherdown “...and it is just what you might expect a nutty professors home to be like, extremely eccentric and stuffed top to bottom and back to front with books, records and CDs. There were book shelves in the kitchen, in every room, they lined the walls, jam-packed must have been ten thousand books or more. The bathroom had book shelves! Outside stood three mighty wooden sheds full of, you guessed it, books. Lots of the books in the sheds were written by CW himself as they were first editions sent to CW by the publisher. Imagine my delight when Colin invited us to select a few and he would sign them. Colin is also an amazing chef, he personally cooked us a simply brilliant meal of rich dark meat and we washed it down with more red wine than I can ever recall drinking in one sitting. What a wonderful kind and interesting host.”

Sources:
    The article about Mailer and the picture are found in the well-titled: “The Naked and the Read,” by J. Michael Lennon, The Times Literary Supplement, March 7, 2018.
    The first quote about the Wilson collection is from The Guardian, Dec. 9, 2013 and the second is found at colinwilsononline.com
    I learned about Wilson’s library in a review of his book, Beyond the Robot, by Michael Dirda, The Washington Post, August 31, 2016.