read all the books I own but haven't read

and I took about 50 books to Oxfam and the hospice shop. Some of them had been on my shelves for more than 10 years and never read – I was a bit interested but not that interested, and my interest has waned over the years. I didn’t actually feel guilty. I still have a big store of unread books but it looks more manageable now.

From the unread book pile I have recently read How the Irish saved civilization and Welcome to the world, Baby Girl and they were both terrific. I’m sorry I put them off for so long.

and really, I have far, far, too many books. I am buying more books! I am crazy.

but it’s still avery good goal even though I shall probably never manage to do it. I don’t think it’s impossible. It really just needs some dedication. I never have time to read properly, but one day I may make time.

Reading “The Long Wintr” and “Chronicles” by Bob Dylan connected me with the joy of reading again. So happy to be swept away by a book. As I was looking through the enormous pile of unread books, one fell on my head. I took this as a sign that I should start with that one. It’s called “Daddy, we hardly knew you” and is by Germaine Greer. I recommend this for the excellent writing and the suspense of the search, but it is too long. We get a lot about Australian birds and trees that we could really do without. On the other hand we get a lot about WWII that I never knew which I found quite fascinating, but some people might find that bit rather boring. Anyway, apart from the fact that there is really too much research in this book, and not enough of Germaine’s first person experiences, it’s a triumph and I went to bed early to finish it.

My goodness, can that woman research things when she gets the bit between her teeth!!!! She is one monomaniac. But she is also inspiring, because I immediately started doing some geneological research myself, which won’t be nearly as hard as Germaine’s in that I have only to go to the Public Record Office in Reading (I think) to find out what I need to know, but I wonder how much it will cost? As she says, you can haemorrage money when you need to look at the public records.

This was a very small book but it contained some great insights into the mystery of life. And what makes a good story. Susie gave me this book for my birthday in October. It took very little time to read but it’s very bitty, so you can read the same bit a few times. I like Vonnegut! I should read more of his books.

that I found I had bought two more books lately. One is Author Author, by David Lodge, and the other is about an explorer. Flo gave me the new Jeremy Clarkson for Chrsistmas (which is the easiest, so I’m reading it, and the Clarkson sarcasm has me roaring with laughter although I would not tolerate his views if they were not so amusingly worded. He’s like PJ ORourke in that respect.) I also bought a collection of the writings of Boris Johnson, which are also amusing from time to time, but a bit old hat as they are a collection of his old Telegraph columns, and I remember some of them from reading the Telegraph.

after seeing the film: A Cock and Bull story.

Again, not one from the pile, but for Book Group. It is a modern classic so I was quite interested in it, but with such a disgusting person as the main protagonist it’s difficult to feel any empathy. One keeps going by admiring the prose and the inventiveness. Another problem is the fact that it reads like a Brothers Grimm fairy tale, and if you only like realism it just won’t appeal.

Interestingly, both Judith and I who had read to the end, had more sympathy for the character overall, seeing him as a tragically deformed character who could have been saved. So for the others who wanted to give up reading it, we recommended they try to finish.

I don’t really like the book group. I think it is neither a friendship group nor a group that is interested in books. I always think these things take time but I have given it quite a bit of time, and it hasn’t evolved.

James Murray worked on the OED for 35 years.

At first he worked in Primrose Hill, and caused a scriptorium (office containing all the slips in pigeon holes) to be built in his garden. Eventually he needed to move to Oxford, where another scriptorium was built. Murray saw a great deal more research was needed. He sent out an appeal for more volunteers to fill the gaps in the reading and especially, instances of “ordinary” words. At the peak of their labours, 1,000 slips were arriving at the scriptorium every day.

Murray wore a long white beard, and in spite of the stresses of his job, a serene and amused expression in his eyes. He and his wife Ada had eleven very intelligent and successful children, all of whom worked in the scriptorium for their pocket money. Murray was particularly kind to one of his contributors, an American doctor whom he discovered to be an inmate of Broadmoor mental hospital, having murdered a London workman during a schizophrenic attack.

Murray died of cancer of the prostate in 1915, and the work was completed in the same style as the one he had set out.

The story of the dictionary is a very interesting one. These are some of the highlights, but the book is a delight to read, being very well-written. It is a remarkable book.

The first great task was to decide the perameters of the work. Words of every era were to be included, through Chaucer’s Middle English and Shakespeare’s Tudor English through the consequent proliferation of words to the present day. Not only was a definition to be given of all the words in the English language, but a history of that word, with quotations, to show different shades of meaning changing over periods of time.

How to find readers to contribute all the quotations needed for comparison by the editors and sub-editors? Furnivall, the keen but disorganised first editor, successfully enlisted volunteers between flirtations with young women and teaching them to scull on the Tideway. A rowing club is named after him.
The worthy gentlemen and ladies who volunteered were assigned books, or whole authors to read, and responded with bundles and bundles of slips, containing headword, quotation and reference.

When James Murray took over the editorship from Furnivall he was passed an enormous pile of slips that Furnivall had stacked in his hallway. Unfortunately Furnivall had lost a great many more. Murray found a dead rat in one sack of slips, and a live mouse with her family in another. Furnivall had lost his address book, so he had lost track of many sub-editors, some of whom had died or moved, leaving behind piles of slips.

“The letter H was missing in its entirety, as was the slightly less important Q and Pa. The slips for G were very nearly burned with the household rubbish when one Mrs Wilkes turned out the house in the wake of her husband’s death.”