List Price: $15.00 Details

Save: $2.19 (15%)

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns

FREE delivery Thursday, April 6 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon

Or fastest delivery Thursday, March 30. Order within 20 hrs 52 mins

Only 1 left in stock - order soon

[{"displayPrice":"$12.81","priceAmount":12.81,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"12","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"81","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"jCu0aEAIG%2B3Yg6lxBR7dGIWBhQM3PMDnSEUftd5Pb3%2F1AAhRo04l924xmcts5Nue%2F6C9xadxd2MgrceM2%2FYKSpvKxwOHqAX9IDZjWdEZkR6CJuiLUdAYAz%2BEI4QIjnaMlDDdS1FKdYKn%2F5nJ02B9FQmLVYYw68cf02iNcwkO6BnXVpEq2YFeQxY3cLnYca%2Bl","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW"},{"displayPrice":"$6.13","priceAmount":6.13,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"6","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"13","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"jCu0aEAIG%2B3Yg6lxBR7dGIWBhQM3PMDnQdW%2Bz6wZo49NDeJ7zc5DPfRenTv08OZUUT%2BaG6kyDhCbWE6s4o0gtbZ102NMNO5%2FGMteSsVB%2FCJ%2FTXPJ8iSetOB6J4u4Exl6xdkNP4duU46eTMDZ5w4ETOuiOJKl9M9eeuFY0xALrZkOEBbVSmi0OqZ%2FQ%2F4y6E%2Ff","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED"}]

$$12.81 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Payment

Secure transaction

Ships from

Amazon

Sold by

bookgardens

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

Details

Payment

Secure transaction

We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more

Ships from

Amazon

Sold by

bookgardens

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt.

Read full return policy

Add a gift receipt for easy returns

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime

FREE delivery Tuesday, April 4 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon

Or fastest delivery Thursday, March 30. Order within 20 hrs 52 mins

Select delivery location

Used: Good | Details

Sold by Sixth Cents Solutions LLC

Fulfilled by Amazon

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Other Sellers on Amazon

Added

Not added

$13.20
FREE Shipping on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon.

Sold by: Michigan treasures resale

Added

Not added

$13.40
FREE Shipping on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon.

Sold by: Emer06

Added

Not added

$13.49
FREE Shipping on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon.

Sold by: Amazon.com

Flip to back Flip to front

Listen Playing... Paused You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

See this image

Follow the Author

Anne Fadiman

Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader Paperback – November 25, 2000

by Anne Fadiman (Author)

416 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Kindle

"Please retry"

$9.99

—

Audible Audiobook, Unabridged

"Please retry"

$0.00

Free with your Audible trial

Hardcover

"Please retry"

$27.37

$23.30

$1.55

Paperback

"Please retry"

$12.81

$8.00

$1.40

Audio CD

"Please retry"

$21.44

—

Enhance your purchase

Perfectly balanced between humor and erudition, Ex Libris establishes Anne Fadiman as one of our finest contemporary essayists.

Anne Fadiman is--by her own admission--the sort of person who learned about sex from her father's copy of Fanny Hill, whose husband buys her 19 pounds of dusty books for her birthday, and who once found herself poring over her roommate's 1974 Toyota Corolla manual because it was the only written material in the apartment that she had not read at least twice.

This witty collection of essays recounts a lifelong love affair with books and language. For Fadiman, as for many passionate readers, the books she loves have become chapters in her own life story. Writing with remarkable grace, she revives the tradition of the well-crafted personal essay, moving easily from anecdotes about Coleridge and Orwell to tales of her own pathologically literary family. As someone who played at blocks with her father's 22-volume set of Trollope ("My Ancestral Castles") and who only really considered herself married when she and her husband had merged collections ("Marrying Libraries"), she is exquisitely well equipped to expand upon the art of inscriptions, the perverse pleasures of compulsive proof-reading, the allure of long words, and the satisfactions of reading out loud. There is even a foray into pure literary gluttony--Charles Lamb liked buttered muffin crumbs between the leaves, and Fadiman knows of more than one reader who literally consumes page corners.

Print length

162 pages
Language

English
Publication date

November 25, 2000
Dimensions

5 x 0.65 x 7.45 inches
ISBN-10

0374527229
ISBN-13

978-0374527228
See all details

Frequently bought together

+
+

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your cart.

Some of these items ship sooner than the others.

Show details Hide details

Choose items to buy together.

by Anne Fadiman Paperback
$12.81
Only 1 left in stock - order soon.
Sold by bookgardens and ships from Amazon Fulfillment.
Get it as soon as Thursday, Apr 6
by Anne Fadiman Paperback
$18.87
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Get it as soon as Monday, Apr 3
by Anne Fadiman Paperback
$17.00
Only 18 left in stock - order soon.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Get it as soon as Wednesday, Apr 5

Anne Fadiman
70
Paperback
83 offers from $1.59
Anne Fadiman
68
Hardcover
71 offers from $0.75
Anne Fadiman
35
Paperback
67 offers from $1.18
Michiko Kakutani
486
Hardcover
81 offers from $3.06
Helene Hanff
1,268
Paperback
170 offers from $2.35
Cathy Rentzenbrink
595
Paperback
57 offers from $8.23

Editorial Reviews

Review

“A smart little book that one can happily welcome into the family and allow to start growing old.” ―Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, The New York Times

“A book for bookworms . . . 18 stylish, dryly humorous essays” ―Entertainment Weekly

About the Author

Anne Fadiman is the author of The Wine Lover's Daughter, a memoir about her father (FSG, 2017). Her first book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down (FSG, 1997), won the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Salon Book Award. Fadiman has also written two essay collections, At Large and At Small and Ex Libris, and is the editor of Rereadings: Seventeen Writers Revisit Books They Love (all published by FSG). She is the Francis Writer-in-Residence at Yale.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 1st edition (November 25, 2000)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 162 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0374527229
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0374527228
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 5 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5 x 0.65 x 7.45 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #660,278 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #713 in General Books & Reading
- #2,578 in Essays (Books)

Customer Reviews:
416 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Anne Fadiman

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Anne Fadiman is the Francis Writer-in-Residence at Yale. Her most recent book is "The Wine Lover's Daughter," a memoir about her father that the Washington Post called "wonderfully engaging" and Christopher Buckley called "the best family memoir yet to come out of the Baby Boom generation.” Her first book, "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down," is an account of the unbridgeable gulf between a family of Hmong refugees and their American doctors. It won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction, among other awards. Fadiman is also the author of two essay collections. The London Observer called "Ex Libris" "witty, enchanting, and supremely well-written." NPR said of "At Large and At Small," "Fadiman is utterly delightful, witty and curious, and she's such a stellar writer that if she wrote about pencil shavings, you'd read it aloud to all your friends."

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5

416 global ratings

5 star		67%
4 star		17%
3 star		10%
2 star		3%
1 star		2%

How customer reviews and ratings work

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Holly

Collection of 18 essays

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 20, 2021

Verified Purchase

This slim volume (162 pages, including the acknowledgements) has been on my bookshelf for quite a while, just waiting to be read. It was purchased after a writing/reading blogger I follow mentioned it more than once as a book which significantly influenced her reading and had a life-long impact.

Like any essay collection, some I enjoyed more than others but found all of them to be interesting and enlightening. She writes about everything from her childhood, surrounded by books, to combining her library with her husbands only after being together for ten years and being married for five. I particularly found the essay 'My Odd Shelf' to be compelling as it directly relates to my own reading life and I have never heard another author address it.

Ms. Fadiman grew up in a family much different than mine and it could be easy to classify her background (and therefore her essays) to be as upper-crust and snobbish. However, one of the reasons I enjoy reading is to understand others' backgrounds and perspectives. This collection accomplishes that, in addition to an excellent overview of significant literature that is helpful.

Bottom line: Quite a good volume that is 4+ stars for me. I also purchased it recently as a graduation gift for a young woman who just earned her bachelor's degree in creative writing. It will be a nice addition to her library.

8 people found this helpful

Helpful

M. Feldman

Stifle that yawn!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 19, 2012

Verified Purchase

This little book has been sitting on my shelf for a while. I've dipped into it on a couple of occasions, always to put it down. I'm a great admirer of Anne Fadiman's "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down," so I couldn't quite figure out why "Ex Libris" did not hold my attention, even though some of the essays are delightful.

Since the third time is reputed to be a charm, I recently picked it up again, determined to read it through. I did, and I also discovered the reasons for my struggle to enjoy the book. The first is the repeated appearance of The Fadiman Family (father, mother, son, daughter Anne, and Anne's husband, an honorary Fadiman). In these essays, the Fadimans, certified bibliophiles, are like interesting dinner guests who stay on for a game of Trivial Pursuit and end up winning it all before the other guests have put a single slice in their own little trivia pies. No fun.

Perhaps the Fadimans overstay their welcome in "Ex Libris" because many of these essays were published separately in Civilization and later collected in this volume. Repetition is an all too common problem in essay collections.

There may be a solution. Leave the book on the nightstand. Pick it up every few months and open the book to a random spot---middle, end. Read from front to back. Try back to front. The author even has a number of useful observations on reading in bed.

M. Feldman

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Amazon Customer

Beautiful collection of essays

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on January 27, 2022

Verified Purchase

I purchased this as a !.99 kindle buy, and after finishing immediately bought 2 hard copies to give as gifts to friends who are readers. I could not have loved this book more - the author's love of books and of reading and of words and of family come through in a series of beautifully written essays on her lifelong relationship with books and scenarios that are original and familiar at the same time.

Helpful

Suzanne LeClair

Absolutely a must read for book lovers!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 3, 2022

Verified Purchase

Such a lovely book of essays. Extremely enjoyable and fun. Don't miss this if you're a book lover. I feel that the author and I could be great friends, you will too.

Helpful

audrey frances

flawless essays on a subject dear to you, gentle reader

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 20, 2002

Verified Purchase

This is an enchanting book of essays compiled from articles originally published in Civilization, the magazine of the Library of Congress. The subjects alone are enough to bring a smile to any "common reader", a phrase used by Virginia Woolf (and borrowed from Samuel Johnson) to connote an educated layperson who reads for pleasure rather than scholarship or criticism. Ms. Fadiman turns a lovely phrase, and the reader will often feel they've found a kindred spirit. Topics include the intimacy of combining libraries, the enjoyment of long words, that odd shelf in your library, the carnal versus the courtly love of books, inscriptions, reading literature about a place while you are there, used books, proofreading, plagiarism, catalogues and reading aloud. While reading about these delightful subjects you will also learn about the author and her family, Arctic exploration, Thomas Macaulay and a host of other indispensable bits. The book succeeds on all fronts.
It was a pleasure to read a book that made me break out the dictionary, and a dangerous little section at the back recommends yet more books that you probably don't need but that will undoubtedly make your life sweeter, as this one does. It can be read quickly, but you'd be wiser to savor it.
Highest recommendation.

8 people found this helpful

Helpful

Jessica M.

Love this book!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 19, 2022

Verified Purchase

Love this book! I give it as a gift to all my reader friends.

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 1, 2022

Verified Purchase

If you love books, bookshelves, bookstores, writing or whatever your relationship is to books, read this. Can't wait to read her other essay collections.

Helpful

Speaks to the book fanatic

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 31, 2000

Verified Purchase

What a marvelous book!
When Anne Fadiman started to describe the merger of her library with her husband's (never mind that they had been married for years and had children together, this was the event that convinced her they were *really* married), I knew I had stumbled on a kindred soul. Anne Fadiman can write, and she chooses to write about what it means to live a life surrounded by (and wallowing in, let's admit it!) books.
Her love affair with the written word permeates this book. The details of her life are completely different than mine, but this book made me feel like I understood her from the inside out. I read large parts of this book out loud, to anyone I could find who seemed like they might find it amusing. Most of them ran out and got themselves a copy of the book. I can't read it out loud to you, so all I can say is if you love reading, if you are consumed with a love of the written word, Anne Fadiman's book will speak to the deepest part of your soul.

16 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Ellie P.

Bibliophiles, form an orderly queue...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on January 17, 2009

Verified Purchase

This lovely little volume is a collection of essays about books and reading - not just generalisations but deeply personal habits and experiences, such as reading with her partner by the Grand Canyon and merging libraries with him when they moved in together. I bought it after finding it frequently quoted from in `The Book Addict's Treasury' (by Julie Rugg and Lynda Murphy); I found it very enjoyable and once again I recognised myself in much of it, but it is very obviously American and sometimes slips into exaggerated self-righteousness and almost religious fervour and enthusiasm, which is quite offputting.

All kinds of bookish behaviour is documented and explored within the eighteen essays. Some explore the various ways of shelving loved books - chronologically, alphabetically, by genre or some other method. Should your partner's books be merged with yours, and if so, when and how? Others look at the joy to be found in words - new words, magical words, complicated words. One discusses those books that just don't fit anywhere; one explores poetry; one entire essays explores the sinful habit of spread-eagling open books on a table instead of using a bookmark. One reflects on an ancient guide to womanhood and motherhood, hopelessly and terrifyingly out of date for a mother today. Some reflect on spelling, grammar, editing and storage. My favourite discusses the inscriptions made on the flyleaf of a book - and I have put extra thought into my own ever since! Recommended for book lovers everywhere.

3 people found this helpful

Ms. C. J. Mcelwee

This one's for the Obsessive/Compulsive bibliophiles!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 15, 1999

Verified Purchase

You can always tell an obsessive/Compulsive reader and collector of books, they like nothing more than a book about books! And this should reside on the "odd shelf" amongst a number of others of its type all worthy of your time. This little book is sheer delight to the likes of you and I who would rather buy a book than probably almost anything else. I found myself between these pages, and in or between the definitions Ms Fadiman records. My parents were not quite as bookish at this stage, although they both claimed an obsession with reading in their youth, and we had books in the house; so as soon as I was able to earn pocket money it was straight up to the secondhand bookshop that resided in the less fashionable part of the high street to spend hours pouring over the possibilities to take up residence in my diaphanous bag home. The touch and smell were intoxicating and I would even put up with the grumpy storekeeper (and often they are old grouches - I often wonder if it is because they resent having to part with their finds!) in order to indulge my passion. A Christmas without a pile of oblong festively-wrapped parcels (my mother often felt I needed something more practical in my stocking!) was always a disappointment. Fortunately, it was also a rarity if everyone else was to have a good time! Also, perhaps not surprisingly my siblings followed in my footsteps into bookishness, and although we have many overlaps of taste, we tend to collect in different areas, so increasing the family horde.
I live on the first floor of a small London flat, and my friends are always surprised not to find that I have, involuntarily, moved to the ground floor (hopefully when the current tenants are away!). It is a compulsion to possess both the physical book and the intellectual content of a book which is obviously why so often they are called friends. Ms Fadiman captures this in her essays. She also captures how like fragrance a book is, picking it up it is sometimes more evocative than a photograph of the time it was read, where it was bought or by whom it was gifted. I will certainly be gifting this volume to one or two over the coming festive season.
I always loved the description that I heard Umberto Eco make in a documentary once, when he said that at night when he left his library, he often had a sense of all the books whispering to each other behind his back. It is a wonderful analogy of what goes on in any readers mind.

2 people found this helpful

Book fiend

This will ring a bell with any book lover

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 23, 2018

Verified Purchase

A charming series of short essays written by an American who loves her books - and she writes most entertainingly on all facets of owning and sorting and keeping books - the difficulty of deciding what to keep, as well as the challenge of merging collections when you move in with someone etc., etc. If you have lots of books and find it hard to part with any this book is for you...

Drusilla Wieloch

Book fanatics should all read this

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 4, 2020

Verified Purchase

Bookworms of the world unite! I just loved this book, I felt that I had met a new friend. It can be very lonely being an ardent reader, so I was very happy to find there are whole families of us! I like her style. The only thing wrong with this book is that it’s much much too short.

Titania78

If you love books, read this one!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on January 8, 2013

Verified Purchase

This book has been a great favourite of mine over many years, and I buy it as a modest gift for other book lovers. The essay is a very under-rated literary form these days, but this book really searches out the charms of reading and the value of literacy and literature. It is so personal, you warm to the writer and to her family, especially her husband. She has the ability to make the idea of reading fundamental to the art of living. Her own literary style, combined with humour, make this book a very elegant gift to share.

See all reviews

Amazon Music Stream millions of songs	Amazon Advertising Find, attract, and engage customers	6pm Score deals on fashion brands	AbeBooks Books, art & collectibles	ACX Audiobook Publishing Made Easy	Sell on Amazon Start a Selling Account

Amazon Business Everything For Your Business	Amazon Fresh Groceries & More Right To Your Door	AmazonGlobal Ship Orders Internationally	Home Services Experienced Pros Happiness Guarantee	Amazon Ignite Sell your original Digital Educational Resources	Amazon Web Services Scalable Cloud Computing Services

Audible Listen to Books & Original Audio Performances	Book Depository Books With Free Delivery Worldwide	Box Office Mojo Find Movie Box Office Data	ComiXology Thousands of Digital Comics	DPReview Digital Photography	Fabric Sewing, Quilting & Knitting

Goodreads Book reviews & recommendations	IMDb Movies, TV & Celebrities	IMDbPro Get Info Entertainment Professionals Need	Kindle Direct Publishing Indie Digital & Print Publishing Made Easy	Amazon Photos Unlimited Photo Storage Free With Prime	Prime Video Direct Video Distribution Made Easy

Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands	Amazon Warehouse Great Deals on Quality Used Products	Whole Foods Market America’s Healthiest Grocery Store	Woot! Deals and Shenanigans	Zappos Shoes & Clothing	Ring Smart Home Security Systems

eero WiFi Stream 4K Video in Every Room	Blink Smart Security for Every Home	Neighbors App Real-Time Crime & Safety Alerts	Amazon Subscription Boxes Top subscription boxes – right to your door	PillPack Pharmacy Simplified	Amazon Renewed Like-new products you can trust

Buy new: $12.81$12.81 FREE delivery: Thursday, April 6 on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon. Ships from: Amazon Sold by: bookgardens

Buy used: $6.13

Other Sellers on Amazon

Follow the Author

Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader Paperback – November 25, 2000

Enhance your purchase

Frequently bought together

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Editorial Reviews

Review

About the Author

Product details

Videos

About the author

Anne Fadiman

Customer reviews

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

Buy new:

$12.81

FREE delivery: Thursday, April 6 on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon.

Ships from: Amazon

Sold by: bookgardens

Buy used:

$6.13