Very Old Books on My Shelves

We have many bookcases in our house. Today I want to share the books in the secretary, some of the oldest books, many badly worn.

They came to us in many ways, picked up at bookstores and sales and inherited from family.

Blaise Pascal's Pensees was a new book I purchased after taking a philosophy course in college. I bought several other philosophers at an estate sale in the early 1970s including Lucretius On The Nature of Things and Marcus Aurelius' Meditations.

The Meditations is inscribed, "Read, Ponder, and be Wise," and dated 1902.

I was a freshman in high school when I noticed Archy and Mehitabel by Don Marquis on a friend's parent's bookshelf. I would stop by her house on my way to school and I read the book while I waited. I bought a paperback copy and later found Archy Does His Part dated 1935.

Years ago my son and I helped an older couple downsize for a retirement home. We carted boxes of books to the library resale shop. I kept a few for my own library, including Carol's copy of Little Women.

It was a gift from her mother in 1932. Inserted are newspaper articles about the movie version starring Katherine Hepburn.

 The volume was illustrated.

My father found this 1888 copy of Robinson Crusoe which I incorporated into my library after his passing.

 I read it and blogged about it here.

From my grandfather Lynne O. Ramer's library is a 1903 copy of The Complete Short Stories of Guy de Maupassant.

I always loved his bookplate that appears in books from from his college and early teaching days in the late 1920s.

 The Further Poems of Emily Dickinson, published in 1929, include those "withheld by her sister Lavina."

I first read Penguin Island by Anatole France in college, found while browsing the library stacks. This copy dates to 1925.

Modern Library editions on the shelf include Wuthering Heights, The Ordeal of Richard Feveral, my Pascal, and Vanity Fair.

I read George Meredith's The Ordeal of Richard Feveral at university. I picked up this 1913 edition of The Egoist but have not read it.

I have a very old and cheap copy of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The House of the Seven Gables.

 Religious books include The Holy War by Paul Bunyon from 1846.

This copy of the New Testament dates to the early 1800s and is a family heirloom. You can learn about the bible and "Indian Chief John Riley" who gifted it to my husband's great-great-great grandmother here.

A hymnal and worship book was presented to my grandfather in 1950. The wear shows he used it at worship every week for many years.

When I was growing up my family was close to the neighboring Kuhn family. When the youngest daughter passed my aunt was executress of the estate and kept this book which she gave to me.

On the shelves is a complete set of James Barrie and Jane Austen (including her letters and juvenilia).

And my grandfather Ramer's set of Emerson. Somewhere I found George Eliot's Life by Cross.

Mrs. Lincoln's Boston Cook Book from 1899 has the subtitle "What to do and what not to do in cooking."

 Formation of the Union 1750-1829 was published in 1900.

I have several illustrated books of poetry selections including Through the Year with Browning and Pearls from Whittier. I just like them.

I wrote about my Grandfather's Edgar Allan Poe set in a post you can read here.

Other books from my husband's family include the 1881 children's book Reggie's Christmas, which I shared in my post about making a Redwork quilt based on the illustrations.

 I shared a post on this Primary Arithmetic book, too, found here.

 My husband's grandfather's 1880 Spelling-Book is on the shelf.

And his great-grandfather's book The Household Guide dated 1891, which I wrote about here.

Last of all there is a two-volume set of Don Quixote of La Mancha which has had four owners.

Vintage Books, Frozen Climes and the High Seas

One of the pleasures of setting up out bookcases and taking all our books out of boxes is seeing our entire library in one place. We had books in two houses and an office before. I "saw" books I had not seen in a long time.

I have an oak barrister from the 1920s, which my grandfather Lynn O. Ramer bought as a student at Susquehanna University. Gary has a bookcase from his folks.

Balzac set from late 19th c, many pages uncut

In them are a complete edition of Balzac, my nine volume Diary of Samuel Pepys, our Heron Books anniversary edition of the works of Charles Dickens which we bought in our first three years of marriage, and both a vintage set and a new set of Jane Austen.

Arabian Nights 

We have 19th c edition of the complete One Thousand and One Arabian Nights by Burton, my grandfather's set of Edgar Allen Poe, and a two volume 1835 edition of Tobias Smollett's novels.

Volume One of Tobias Smollett works 1835

In the family room we have novels, nonfiction, children's literature, Gary's professional library, reference books, and more heirlooms. I have Little Journeys Into the Homes of the Great from Roycroft Press, Elbert Hubbard's press, that came from my Grandfather.

Little Journeys Into the Homes of the Great

Some books may surprise you. I have had a lifelong interest in Arctic and Antarctic exploration and in sailing days of old. The former interest may have its roots in Mr. Poplar's Penguins, a favorite book from elementary school days.

 I May Be Some Time: Ice and the Enlighten Imagination by Frances Spufford is a beautifully written book on Arctic exploration in the 19th c. and its influence on British society, literature and art. I read it over a long time, enjoying the writing style as much as the subject.

illustration from Cradle of the Deep by Joan Lowell

Cradle of the Deep enchanted me as a girl. Joan Lowell  wrote about growing up as on a merchant ship with her dad. I did not know it was meant to be an autobiography and read it as fiction. It was exposed as a "hoax". Still, ever since reading it I have enjoyed romances of the high seas, including the Horatio Hornblower books by C. S. Forster. And yes I did love the TV series with Ioan Gruffudd.

Horatio Hornblower novels

I read The Great White South about Robert Falcon Scott's Antarctic exploration as a girl and he became my romantic hero when I was about 12. I know today that Scott made serious mistakes but as a girl being stranded in the Antarctic and freezing to death seemed an  awfully big adventure.

The Great White South 

Then there are all the other books, some which I have had since the later 1960s and very early 1970s.