It's Not You, It's Your Books

pitu

Subject: It's Not You, It's Your Books

Amusing essay in teh NYT, although the whole Pushkin thing didn't exactly resonate with me.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/30/books/review/Donadio-t.html?ex=1364529600&en=79a8939314095632&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink wrote: It’s Not You, It’s Your Books[/url]
By RACHEL DONADIO
NYT March 30, 2008
Among the bookish, even casual literary references can turn into romantic deal breakers.

Anybody use GoodReads or other book-based social network sites? I'm only getting a half-hearted experience so far, since my friends are not so motivated to keep playing past the first contact.

livetotravel

Really enjoyed the article.

Do you think the Pushkin reference was based on actually having read that interminable novel-in-verse, Eugene Onegin, in the original Russian, or is future partnership based on having merely read the Nabokov translation? :roll:

To this day I still eye the bookcases inside of apartments and homes that I enter and make some sort of bullshit conclusion based upon what I see on the shelves. Call me shallow, but I think what one reads is very important re intimate and other relationships.

bklyntransplant

Livetotravel, I am guilty of the same thing...and sort of assume that houseguests do the same with my bookshelves (and, before the iPod, my CD collection)....which is why I stash all the "guilty pleasures" in the bedroom bookshelves.

pitu

I'm trying hard to make "so, what are you reading?"
replace "so, what do you do?"


BklynTransplant, your dog is adorable! I saw a black puppy a lot like him/her this morning on Sixth Ave...so cute, even with the devil-butchered ears...

caaahyoko

pitu wrote: I'm trying hard to make "so, what are you reading?"
replace "so, what do you do?"

Good thinking! I'll join you on that one.

bklyntransplant

@ Pitu: thank you so much! He is a little sweetie...the vet thinks he might have a sibling named Red who lives in Park Slope (same ears, wrinkles and sad ears).

According to my boyfriend, one of the reasons we had a second date was that on our first, he saw James Joyce's "Dubliners" in my bag. I waited until our 6th or 7th date to tell him that I cannot finish "Ulysses", despite years of effort.

daver

Shit, I read anything that catches my eye or that someone thrusts into my palms.

I'm a total book whore.

Ugh.

drano

BklynTransplant wrote: Livetotravel, I am guilty of the same thing...and sort of assume that houseguests do the same with my bookshelves (and, before the iPod, my CD collection)....which is why I stash all the "guilty pleasures" in the bedroom bookshelves.

That's pretty funny - every time I go into an apartment with absolutely nothing but highbrow reading material in sight I always think to myself that there's more likely than not a bunch of Us Weeklies hastily stashed under the couch or in a cabinet somewhere. Keep it plausible!

Me, I don't care. All my stuff is out in the open - except for the complete run of Penthouse, I keep that in climate controlled storage.

alafairnadia

If I had a second bedroom, I'd dump all the books in there. I have too many disparate piles of crap. books about combinatorics mixed in with tons of sci fi, gay porn, porn art books, information theory books, some literary fiction, tons of spy novels and way too many copies of harry potter books make me look like a complete nutbar.

though almost every time someone crashes at my places and has time to review th stacks on their own, they end up borrowing something. or stealing my copy of the economist.

I haven't tried the social networking sites devoted to this but I think I might fail their initial test. haven't read the kite runner and am pretty sure I won't ...

if there were a dating site, I'm pretty sure I'd be hooked up with a socially inept dork of magnificent proportions.

shishkab

Subject: Re: It's Not You, It's Your Books

pitu wrote:
Anybody use GoodReads or other book-based social network sites? I'm only getting a half-hearted experience so far, since my friends are not so motivated to keep playing past the first contact.

i use GoodReads, but like you, my friends aren't nearly as motivated to keep up with it, 'cept one.