How do you arrange your literary bookshelves?

3/3/2014

The index for my debut author interviews is the only place I’ve knowingly arranged anything booky in alphabetical order by author surname. It just doesn’t work for me out in the real world: when I’m scanning my bookshelves for a particular book, the name of the author is often the last thing that comes to mind. My collection of novels is ordered geographically – since you’re asking, by setting of the book rather than author location – two shelves for Britain (subdivided into the various regions); a woefully inadequate single shelf for North America; one for Europe; another for Asia and Australasia; one for Africa, South America and the Caribbean. It’s totally bonkers – I’m constantly reassigning the underrepresented parts of the globe when I run out of shelf space, and in rather too many novels the exact geographical setting is left unclear – but it’s the best system I’ve come up with so far. I only wish I could persuade my husband to donate his shelf of thrillers to the charity shop and give me more room.

Of course there are more eccentric systems: I’m sure Leila, in Lottie Moggach’s debut Kiss Me First, isn’t the only woman to arrange her books by colour. Is that really so wacky? If book covers are designed to look attractive, why not give the same level of attention to their patterning on the shelves? With a block of dark green Virago here and a patch of orange Penguin there, you’ve got a do-it-yourself Mondrian painting. If you really want to go for style over function, you could intersperse the books with interesting objects, but where do you put the rest of your books?

So come on readers, it’s time to fess up: how do you arrange the novels on your shelves? I'll be posting next on Friday with a look at Samantha Ellis's virtual bookshelves via our review of her literary memoir How to be a Heroine. Do join me.

20 Comments

Safia link

3/3/2014 04:14:01 am

I like the geographical layout - by setting, not author's origin though? That's verging on the chaotic, eg, if you were a Rosie Thomas fan. :-) I have poetry and drama in separate sections but arranged alphabetically. Fiction is, I'm afraid, also arranged alphabetically. I like the idea of Balzac sitting next to Banville - interesting conversation if it were a dinner party.

Annecdotist

4/3/2014 08:12:38 am

Yes, my system's quite chaotic and it means that a particular author's work sprawls about the shelves. I don't have a lot of classics but I like your method with the contemporary writers conversing with the dead. Wonder what language they'd speak?

Diane link

3/3/2014 06:55:09 am

When my husband and I made our own built in book shelves we purposefully made one extra large to hold some tall non-book items, so we are definitely in the category of "intersperse with interesting objects". The rest are arranged by subject, then by size (tallest to shortest)...with a few more interesting items interspersed (smile)

Annecdotist

4/3/2014 08:15:10 am

Thanks, Diane, sounds an interesting system. We've also got custom-made built-in book shelves but for some reason they're identical heights, so even some of the taller books have to lie down horizontally.

Paula Reed Nancarrow link

6/3/2014 01:59:01 pm

My ex and I, both being graduate students, carried around boxes and boxes and boxes of books for years, and generally arranged them by genre or topic. The divorce at least eliminated duplicates from classes we had taken together. When I lost my home in the foreclosure crisis (http://paulareednancarrow.com/2014/02/27/feng-shui-master/), I gave up all but a few very personally important books, and they're not hard to arrange now at all. In truth what is most important about them is organized in my head, and in how they have changed me. At least for now. My mother, who was diagnosed last year with Alzheimers, feels the books on her shelves are mocking her, poor dear, and wants me to take them all. I wish with all my heart I had room.

Annecdotist

7/3/2014 02:45:52 am

Thanks for your comment, Paula. Totally forgot about the trauma of dividing the spoils (I recall it more with records, yes, vinyl, shows how long ago it was). Of course, we don't actually need our physical books, although I'm very clingy with mine (and drafting a follow-up post on the dilemma of lending books). Really feel for your mother, would never have imagined that happening, but makes sense if books have been important.
Will pop across and have a look at your post. Thanks.

Caroline link

5/3/2014 01:59:28 am

Hi Anne, I've been struggling with organising my books for some time. I wrote about it on my blog about a year ago. http://www.bookword.co.uk/how-do-you-organise-your-books/
Since then I've moved house and can never find where the books are that i want, even if I saw them within 24 hours. So I have started to arrange them alphabetically by author (fiction) but it's not really working for me. It doesn't reflect my use - such as the older women in fiction theme I am pursuing at the moment, so I have stopped.

I have a section for short stories. Another for fiction. Others are arranged by height (art and knitting books esp). Or subject matter (aging, for example) and of course my favourite TBR shelf by my bed.
Nice blog post. Thanks.
Caroline.

Annecdotist

5/3/2014 03:51:22 am

Thanks for reading and commenting, Caroline, and for the link to your post which I enjoyed very much. moving house is a great opportunity to reorganise your system, but a lot of books takes a lot of time And frustrating when you want that book right NOW.

Linda link

5/3/2014 11:04:12 am

Non-fiction is roughly arranged by subject. Fiction not deliberately arranged at all but I've got a shelf of favourite old books that I want to keep forever, other shelves of books that I've read and will probably pass on to friends or charity shops when the shelves get too full, and several piles in my bedroom waiting to be read.
In a previous life I ran a secondhand bookshop and tried to arrange the fiction by genre and then by author alphabetically, but most customers seemed intent on un-arranging them! I was pleasantly surprised one day when my 12 year old daughter offered to tidy the children's books. That's right, she arranged them by colour. They looked much nicer that way!

Annecdotist

6/3/2014 06:30:25 am

Hi, Linda. That's the downside of other people – they have their own ways of doing things – but good for your daughter!
Your shelves for books for keeping versus books for giving away brings to mind another possible arrangement, as used in one of the goodreads apps, which groups them by star rating. Why not?
http://annegoodwin.weebly.com/reading-and-reviews.html

Susan link

6/3/2014 12:55:58 am

It's boring old alphabetical for me apart from travel writing. Have you been to Daunts? They're sections are all arranged geographically - it sounds like your kind of bookshop.

Annecdotist

6/3/2014 06:32:53 am

Thanks, Susan, I think a special visit to London is required to see this! I wonder if that's where I used to go for international maps and travel books?

Safia link

11/3/2014 11:16:36 pm

And then I was thinking ... I remember being told once that a filing system should be organised with the thought, 'how do people look for these things?' After reading all the great comments above, I've come to the conclusion that how we organise our bookshelves is dictated by how we read. Me, when I find an author I like, I set about reading more by him/her, eg, Per Pettersen, Kate Grenville, Hisham Matar of late. So, it makes sense for my books to be arranged by author and alphabetically because that's how I look for them. Now you, Anne - mmm ... geographically by setting ... is it perhaps true that reading is a form of escapism for you, or at least that you are a former traveller, who thinks, 'where shall I go today?' when approaching your shelves? As for the people who arrange by size or colour, perhaps it's something to do with thinking in images more so than in words, ie, they can remember exactly what the book looks like (kinesthetic types). These are perhaps the most artistic amongst your commentators.

Annecdotist

12/3/2014 04:18:11 am

Thanks, Safia, a very neat summing up. it's a good point that filing systems are often arranged in the interests of the filer rather than the seeker, which is why they don't always work. And in recognising the quirkiness of my geographical system, you are sowing the seeds of another post! It can't be all escapism, with today's post about the aftermath of terror, but I do need to be clear in a book about where it is I am.

Sandra Danby link

17/3/2014 12:24:11 am

A-Z for me. Separate sections for fiction, poetry, art, how to write, reference. And a huge to-read shelf downstairs with books put there any-old-how as my husband uses that shelf too and we buy too many books for each other. And we love every gift! :) SD

Annecdotist

17/3/2014 04:16:48 am

Oh yes, that TBR pile needs a whole classification system to itself! Thanks for sharing, Sandra.

Charli Mills

4/8/2014 05:34:45 pm

Ha, ha! My arrangement is topical and by height!

Annecdotist

7/8/2014 07:53:57 am

Thanks for joining in, Charli. So if your books are arranged by height, do you have different height shelves to suit them?

Charli Mills

7/8/2014 10:16:20 am

Yes, I do! I have one book shelf the Hub built just for paperbacks, so that the other bookshelves with adjustable heights could be used for hardbacks and paperbacks of odd sizes. Maybe because I read lots of non-fiction I have random sizes more so than if my collection were paperback or hardcover novels. Writing books live on one shelf and below are four shelves of American history, arranged in groups by frontier, Native American, Civil War, North Carolina, colonies, Pacific Northwest. The height variation helps tab the end of one group and beginning of another. Then I have another book case of science-related books (geology, birds, archeology) with a few shelves of Medieval history and literature.

Annecdotist

7/8/2014 10:39:04 am

Wow, that's impressive, Charli. When we moved into this house my H built some lovely bookshelves to replace an ornament display cabinet between two rooms which was not to our taste. It was a matter of how many shelves could fit into the space and I don't think either of us clicked that we had a fair number of larger books, like atlases, that ended up having to be stacked on their sides. Next time we'll get it right.

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