Memories Of Familiar Books

Excerpt from Memories of Familiar Books The publication of old books under new names is said to be a growing evil in the book trade. The publishers, therefore, think it right to explain the change of title under which a new edition of Mr. Reed's delightful Essays is offered to the public. Before these were collected and issued by the present publishers - indeed, while they were in course of publication in the World - a great publishing house issued a volume of Essays, by an author of high repute, bearing the same title. Mr. Reed's publishers anticipated and advised him of the probable result of using for his book the title he had selected and used in the columns of the World. But he had learned to love the words "Among My Books," justly thought them most appropriate to his work, and, believing himself their proper owner, held firmly to his own, yielding only to a suggestion to use the words "World Essays" as an outer title, in the hope of avoiding confusion. The result was as the publishers anticipated. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

When we think of getting older, we know we will slowly lose more and more of our memory—and with it, our sense of where we belong and how we connect to others. We might relax a little if we considered the improvements in computer data storage, which may lead us into a future when the limits of our memory become less constricting. In this book, John Scanlan explores the nature of memory and how we have come to live both with and within it, as well as what might come from memory becoming a process as simple as retrieving and reading data. Probing the ways philosophers look at memory, Scanlan reveals that some argue that being human means having the ability to remember, to see oneself as a being in time, with a past and future. At the same time, he shows, our memories can undo our present sense of time and place by presenting us with our past lives. And in a digital age, we are immersed in a vast archive of data that not only colors our everyday experiences, but also supplies us with information on anything we might otherwise have forgotten—breaking down the distinction between the memories of the individual and the collective. Drawing on history, philosophy, and technology, Memory offers an engaging investigation of how we comprehend recollection and how memory, as a phenomenon, continually remakes everyday life.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1876.

This book examines the character and relevance of remembrance, inviting readers to think creatively and deeply about the ways that memories are transmitted, recorded, and distorted through time and space. Ranging from molecular genetics and astrophysics to law and Indigenous oral histories, the essays draw from a diverse group of contributors to capture different perspectives on memory. Reflecting upon memory in engaging and unexpected ways, this collection offers an interdisciplinary roadmap for exploring how, why, and when we remember.