Monday, January 21, 2008

Umberto Eco’s Anti-Library

Interesting quote from Taleb's Black Swan

“The writer Umberto Eco belongs to that small class of scholars who are encylopedic, insightful, and nondull. He is the owner of a large personal library (containing thirty thousand books), and separates visitors into two categories: those who react with “Wow! Signore professore dottore Eco, what a library you have! How many of these books have you read?” and the others - a very small minority - who get the point that a private library is not an ego-boosting appendage but a research tool. Read books are far less valuable than unread ones. The library should contain as much of what you do not know as your financial means, mortgage rates, and the currently tight read-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.
We tend to treat our knowledge as personal property to be protected and defended. It is an ornament that allows us to rise in the pecking order. So this tendency to offend Eco’s library sensibility by focusing on the known is a human bias that extends to our mental operations. People don’t walk around with anti-resumes telling you what they have not studied or experienced (it’s the job of their competitors to do that), but it would be nice if they did. Just as we need to stand library logic on its head, we will work on standing knowledge itself on its head. Note that the Black Swan comes from our misunderstanding of the likelihood of surprises, those unread books, because we take what we know a little too seriously.
Let us call this an antischolar - someone who focuses on the unread books, and makes an attempt not to treat his knowledge as a treasure, or even a possession, or even a self-esteem enhancement device - a skeptical empiricist.”


After reading this piece, I don't fear the growing number of unread books in my collection. And it inspires me to buy more books and not wait till I have read all of the present unread set which I was doing till now.

6 comments:

Matthew Cornell said...

Thanks for the excerpt! I'm still wrapping my head around the idea. I'm like you: My anti-library is growing, and it *does* invoke a bit of unease - all that work to do! But I look at my purchases from the right (I believe) perspective: They're an investment, a resource for when the time comes for needing that knowledge. I know I can't know it all (which is a strength), and these books represent an act of faith - that my future self will need them some day. It's a kind of preparation for the unknown, I suppose...

Great stuff!

Inigo said...

Wow! A friend and I were just talking the other day about the growing piles of "unread books" we have and I mentioned this passage from Taleb's book.

Anyway, I came to the same conclusion. The value of unread books is much unappreciated.

Inigo
http://whoistheabsurdman.blogspot.com/

Anonymous said...

wonderful post, thank you.

Anonymous said...

Many thanks.

Anonymous said...

Complex Post. This enter helped me in my school assignment. Thanks Alot

Ixarix said...

I just read your blog and now I don't feel guilty about the unread books I own. In fact I cherish them all the more now.