The collection and hoarding of bits and pieces is basic to all animals, from the squirrel with his nuts . . . to the anthologist with his oddments stored up in his memory.
—Elizabeth Goudge, A Book of Comfort: An Anthology
I am sitting in a church basement, surrounded by the remnants of a man’s life, the 250 cartons of books he abandoned when he crossed the bar. An academic antiquarian library has skimmed off an additional 50.
The collecting had gotten out…