"Scanning the bookshelves of others is a favorite pastime, and sitting here canvassing my own makes me fully understand why Stout recently left his San Francisco house to move into a warehouse: he wanted to be surrounded by not just some but all of his books, to feel among the living. As one who has lugged an ever-increasing number of boxes of books from apartment to apartment, city to city, unable to part with nary a one, I feel the same way.
"Stout's presentation was so inspiring yet so bittersweet because his vocation seems entirely of an era that is passing us by. For centuries we've looked to libraries as historic evidence of cultured civilizations: will electronic texts fill that bill for future generations? While I'll admit that I'm intrigued by the Kindle, it will never replace the rows and stacks of books that crowd my house. And when I first settle into my comfy chair ready to read with that new device, I'll probably feel as if I had a phantom limb — I'll mourn the absence of my fingers slowly turning the pages."
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