When all's said and done...

Where do these phrases come from? Why does every language have some form of throat clearing to begin statements. In French it's 'Enfin!" or "Ecoute!" The young begin with 'Basically.." until I could smack them. Or the even worse "Like..."

This rambling preambling is a prelude to a proclamation: I am not a true bookseller. The phrase "When all's said and done' has been popping into my head recently, followed invariably by the thought that when all is said and done I am not a born antiquarian bookseller. Daft. Who IS born a bookseller? What do I mean by 'bookseller' in this context? Define bookseller. A seller of books. I am certainly that at the moment (occasionally anyway!) What I am NOT is an enthusiastic pursuer or seeker out of secondhand and antiquarian books to sell to others. I love books. I want to buy them for myself. I don't much care if other people find the books THEY want, although it has been a good enough way to make a living for a while. I don't even care if the books I buy for myself are first editions as long as they are in nice bindings, on good paper with a good clear type face. I like Penguins too so I'm not going to obsess about hardbacks. Don't get me wrong, I'm not insensible to the history of a book. When I come across a first edition of Virginia Woolf's work published by the Hogarth Press, the cover designed by her sister Vanessa Bell, I feel I have in my hand a direct link to significant events and figures in the life of that exceptional, gifted, troubled lady. On the other hand I don't give a tinker's cuss about the different editions of Scott or Burns.

A pre-17th century book could give me a thrill as long as it wasn't a religious tract (so many of them are.) A grimoire or a book of animal husbandry or a medical textbook or a novel (unusual, I haven't yet handled a copy of Gilgamesh, an original Chaucer or the Satyricon!) would certainly get the juices going, but how often do I come across them? Topographical accounts, lore, legend or historical accounts - well, OK.

I am not spurred on by the thrill of the chase any more - the possibility of something rare turning up in the next box. It IS a bit like panning for gold and just as hard to stop when the next sieve might hold the nugget.

It would be lovely to own a case full of beautiful bindings, on the other hand I think I'd rather have a Lalique lampshade casting beautiful colours across the pages of the pleasant, servicable book I'm reading entirely for its content.