Anne Fadiman's Relationship With Books

The relationship between Anne Fadiman (author of Ex Libris) and books can be clearly seen when reading all her eighteen essays. She has a strong relationship with books, but this can be associated with her always being around books all the time since her childhood. I wish I had a childhood like hers filled with books. The first books I came in contact with outside school was a children’s book on how to speak and write in Spanish.

My mother thought it would be a great decision if I were to be learning a new language while learning English at the same time. With my brother she chose another path after seeing my results she decided to let him learn English first and then teach him Spanish. My history with books in school started in Kindergarten

where the books were cuttable and were printed. These books were of many stories which consisted of literary short stories rather than fairy tales. Each of these had a moral which would be either life values or some lesson to be related to school. These books had some interesting stories, but as well there were tedious stories. Although this is true it did not discourage me from reading because the ratio between the interesting stories and the tedious stories was five to one. After kindergarten, the thin paperback books were introduced to my life. These were short stories filled with pictures and short sentences, but in my second-grade class, I clearly remember there being a section of the class’ library with small novels or as they were referred to in my class “chapter books”. These books were meant for those students that were above the other students. One day I was bored and decided to venture these unknown books, and the first book was The BFG by author Roald Dahl. It took me some time to read, and being an antisocial kid I did not seek for help from my classmates. Not even my teacher could have helped me because I was afraid of asking for help outside of class to avoid making a fool of myself. Finally accomplishing this feat of finishing the book came understanding what I just read. This was done quicker than the actual reading. Understanding that this level of reading was still not meant for me I went back to the thin paperback books. Third grade came around and my relationship with books changed in a spectacular way.
My education from kindergarten to second grade was normal as it can get. One teacher for one school year with a connection to only five days of the week. The grading was simple in kindergarten with a happy green smile signifying that you were doing excellent. All the way to a sad red face which signify that there were problems and there had to be some talk between the teacher and parent. Starting first grade the numbers came up with a four signifying an “A” to 1 being the equivalent to an “F”. Starting third grade with a substitute teacher was a clear sign to many that this was going to be a different school year from the usual. The reason to the substitute was due to our teacher suffered a serious injury before the school year. The injury was close to the start of the school year, so the principal had no time to find a full-time replacement on such short notice. The substitute we had for those few months did barely anything new most of the teaching was a review from the previous school year. A month or so later another substitute and so went the routine every two months. This was messed up to us the students because one the lectures would not flow from one substitute to the other. Secondly, each other had a different way to teach their lessons with some preferring interaction more than the straight out of the book method. With a few months left to the school year, one substitute teacher arrived at our classroom, and with her came a big bookshelf filled with children novels.
This substitute was jolly and filled with love since the first day she met us. Her teaching style was more interesting to our young minds, and of course, she assigned homework. Her homework would be the typical elementary homework to advance in math, history, science or English skills learned that day. As side homework, she would also make us read a chapter per day from any books we wished to choose from her library, and every day once completing this chapter we were to write a short summary/analysis of what we just read. I loved to excel from others so I would read between five to ten chapters per day write my summary/analysis as I finished my chapters, but I would write down the date of the supposed day I read them. She took an interest in me when one day when she observed that I was reading somewhere secluded instead of playing with the other kids. That day she told me when coming back from our lunch break what did I like to read and I responded with a simple “anything that seems interesting to me”. She laughed and then told me that if I wanted to she had a book series that may peak my interest. Magic Tree House series were introduced to me because of her. At the time she told me of this series she had only twenty books from the series and seeing how they peaked my interest she updated her collection to contain the most recent books from the series. She would allow me to be the first to read them by giving them to me after she had purchased them, and to this day I still do not understand what did she saw in me that would make her go do something like that. Buy books for her library with the intention for one of her student to read them or seeing how I was shy to approach people she would approach me and tell me if I needed any help. She also made my parents proud of me when she would tell them every time that I was one f her best students and that I loved to read and for when I was to move to the next year to keep my love for books growing.
I kept on reading past third grade with a now keen interest in the classical novels such as Beowulf, The Odyssey, Frankenstein, Dracula, The Tale of Two Cities, Journey to the Center of the Earth these are just a few of the many I read during my elementary years. Sometimes I just wished to steal them away from the library and keep them at home forever.
I say that most people have a funny story to tell regarding books.

Fadiman seems to share this funny life event regarding books in her chapter of "Never do that to a book". Well, my funny story regarding a book will have to be when I became a criminal to my young mind in fifth grade. Financially wise I was poor meaning that my parents could not afford to buy me all the books that I would want. Going to the bookstore would be a torture when it was not my birthday because I could not take any books home, so when the book fair came along to my school I knew I would just suffer when it was the turn of my class to go and visit the fair. Sure enough fair came around and the few friends I had were better off financially so they got to take two to five books with them while I just settled with being able to read them on the spot. At the time, I was obsessed with The Muppets, and my parents working for the Jim Henson company at the time just fueled it more. My makeshift room was filled with various Muppets objects, and when I went to that book fair I saw something that I wanted very badly. In the cover, it had Kermit the Frog sitting on a stool with the title Before you Leap: A Frog's Eye View of Life's Greatest Lessons. I read the first few pages and I knew that I wanted the book, but the sad part was the fact that I did not have the money for it or had anyone that could lend me the money. I was always a good kid always following orders, but that day I said no one will find out. I

went to the book fair nonchalantly saw the book when no one was looking I grabbed it placed it inside my sweater and dashed away. Once outside I had the adrenaline rush, but when that was over my subconscious started attacking me but I ignored for at least a week or so. When I finished with the book I went back to the book fair and placed it back where it was. Some days later I told my parents and they started laughing at me and I asked them why and they told me that they saw the book where they worked and they could have gotten it for me easily with a cheaper price.
The following years I graduated from elementary school went on to middle school where I would spend all my free time in the library and eventually come to become one of the top readers in my whole school for two years straight.

With growing up and advancing in school free time dwindles down to bare nothing signifying my days of reading of fun were to come end once entering high school. I would read for fun but the task seemed more tiresome because of the vast amount of homework I would receive in a daily amount. In my second year of high school and the partial beginning of my third year, I became more interested in plays and poetry. I would come to read various plays sometimes at a rate of a play per day, and also would write my own poetry. One of the few friends I had back then loved my poetry that we came to create a small book with her drawings and my poetry and handing it out to other friends to have some fun. Like previously said that also came to end when senior year came and free time was gone especially when I was accepted to a private university a year before I was to find out about Pierce College free time was completely annihilated. With being a full-time

student
Now in the present, I read when the opportunity is there to read a book of my interest as long as it does not interfere with my school reading and homework. I tend to read the same classical novels I read back in elementary, but having a bigger mind now I look for challenging books to read as well. Plays still have not left my mind, but poetry has.