I stumbled over something interesting the other day, and knew I had to share it here. I’ve used LibraryThing to create a catalog of my library, and that’s incredibly useful, but also the community of volunteers that runs the site has take on other projects. One of which is called Legacy Libraries.

Legacy Libraries are the libraries of historical people (as well as a few institutions), entered into LibraryThing by dedicated members working from a variety of sources, including published bibliographies, auction catalogs, library holdings, manuscript lists, wills and probate inventories, and personal inspection of extant copies.

They mention that they started with Thomas Jefferson’s library. Years ago on the only trip I’ve ever made to Washington DC, I was thrilled to spend some time with the great man’s library on display in plexiglass boxes, so you could walk up and down what would have been shelves, reading the spines (or not, when they are in ancient languages). Translating from the rarity and expense of books then versus now, it’s truly awe-inspiring. The man was a scholar.

I poked around a little in the Legacy Libraries on LibraryThing, and had to share with you all.

I was amused to learn, when I clicked through into Ian Fleming’s library catalog, that LibraryThing allows for you to see what books in common I share with the selected legacy library (five, three of which are Fleming’s own books, then a Wodehouse novel and Brillat-Savarin’s treatise on food and eating). I share several books in common with Kipling, from classics to the useful Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. With CS Lewis I share an affection for H. Rider Haggard’s tales, and Ernest Thompson Seton’s wildlife and boy’s books. There are also links to external library catalogs which aren’t kept up by LibraryThing, if you want to go further afield.

What use is this knowledge? Oh, probably none. But I enjoyed diving into what a few (there’s a lot of authors I’d like to see which aren’t represented) of my writing heroes were reading. We are what we read, to a great extent. My own library is far less read than I’d like, but I’m working on that. Unlike Dickens or Jefferson, many books are available to me quite cheaply and so I’ve been making up a hoard of books as a proper book wyrm should. I’m building in time for reading them, now that life is settling back down after an upheaval.