A recent Miss Manners column1 discussed the “appalling”2 practice of shelving books “backwards”, with the spines toward the wall. Despite the column begging the question of using books for decoration to begin with, I was pumping my fist – despite my default reaction to the stuffy old ‘rules’ of etiquette being a good ol’ Bert stare3, I’ll pick cherries like Pac-Man – as I read her excoriation of those who would shelve by color4, until I realized that:
- She also derided shelving books based on height, which, well… look at fancy Miss “I Have So Much Wall Space I Don’t Need to Bother Using It Efficiently Or Else I Just Don’t Mind Having Hundreds of Boxes of Books Unshelved in Storage Or I Suppose More Likely Just Don’t Have That Many Books” Manners over here.
- And, uh, I currently have books shelved fore-edge out, and can think of at least three (good!) reasons why one might do that…
Don Norum 