A Problem

Tough to say whether this is as devastating an addiction as heroin (or "horse," as the hep-cats call it) but I am currently in possession of 18 books that I have not read. If I was addicted to heroin I'd never worry about having piles of it just sitting around the apartment. Oh, I certainly have been meaning to read these novels, histories, biographies and essays. It's not that they are boring, undigestable or mere status symbols placed upon the shelves in order to intimidate visitors ("Oh, you've read Mason & Dixon?" "Yes, not one of Pynchon's best."). But they just keep piling up. I made a list now, so perhaps this will be the first step in crawling out of this literary grave which I've dug for myself. In High Fidelity, Nick Hornby writes that fetish objects are not unlike porn, but if I had bookshelves stuffed with porn it'd be highly unlikely that they'd go unread.