Now, that's a "To-Read" Pile

[wshaffer]

According to a BBC radio show I was listening to while cleaning the kitchen, when former prime minister William Gladstone donated his books to found a library, he owned 33,000 volumes, of which he had read 22,000. That makes my "to-read" list on Goodreads of around 50 volumes seem positively puny.

Gladstone apparently delivered all 33,000 volumes to the library personally, taking them by wheelbarrow to the library 3/4 of a mile from his home. Alas, no one seems to have recorded how many round-trips it took to deliver 33,000 volumes by wheelbarrow.

Comments

[wordweaverlynn.livejournal.com]

You have no idea how much better this makes me feel about my current move.

[vvvexation.livejournal.com]

Meeeeeeeeee toooooooooo.

[retsuko.livejournal.com]

Whoa. That's some awesome bookloving right there.

I love this factoid the way I love an interview with a prime minister of Japan a few years back; he was quoted as saying that if he hadn't gone into politics, he would have become a concert violinist. Wow, I thought, there's someone I wish I could have voted for! :)