Seen on the Metro #5

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On my morning commute, I espied a man reading a paperback. I didn't catch the title, but I did notice that the book's covers had been completely torn off. The man would read a page and then fold and crease it under the rest of the book.

It was a interesting method of reading, but my bibliophile heart stopped for a second. I could never imagine treating one of my books that way. I don't even dog-ear my book's pages.

The bookmarks, they were invented for a reason.

Comments

JoanneMarie Faust said…
Could you make a citizen's arrest for the man assaulting that poor book. I really read my books and they usually don't even look used when I'm through. The people who mooch from me at Bookmooch probably are always amazed at lovely and new looking they are. On the other hand, maybe this guy loved this book so much and read it so many times that it was falling apart. I could forgive hime that, well, depending on the book, I guess.
1:40 PM
Meghan said…
The book preserver in me cringed every time I looked over in his direction.

Like you, I'm not even a spine creaser. Whenever buy a book, I always check the condition first. It must be an hold habit from working in both a used bookstore and a library.
1:59 PM
Anonymous said…
The torn-off cover means that the book was thrown away as unsold merchandise by a bookseller - he probably got it either out of the trash, from a friend who worked at a bookstore, or from a store he works at himself. I used to have to do this for a bookstore I worked for and I always hated it, but I would smuggle out anything coverless I wanted to read. My employer would have called it theft, but since they were throwing them out anyway I thought of it as recycling.

He probably felt no responsibility to be nice to the book since it was already trash when he got it. Remainders are a sad thing.
11:30 AM
Meghan said…
I never thought of that possibility. I also think that, with the way he was reading the book, he may have torn the covers off himself.

It was clearly a paperback book so maybe he found the covers did not bend to his will has much as the rest of the book.
11:34 AM
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