Bibliophile Tips: Ways to Declutter Your Book Collection
Hello everyone! I’m back with another round of Bibliophile Tips! Today I’m focusing on decluttering book collections. It’s a problem many avid readers run into. Sometimes our shelves are overflowing and we need to unhaul books. I wanted to share a few tips that have helped me over the years.
Declutter Style #1: A Complete Unhaul
This can be an easy or a difficult task depending on what kind of attachment you have to your books. It requires a lot of focus and concentration. When doing a complete unhaul I like to make three stacks of books after pulling all them off of the bookshelves I’m working on. I then sort it into three separate piles: keep, donate, or maybe. The maybe pile usually ends up being books I’m not too sure I want to part with. Most of the time I’ll put these books on an immediate TBR so that I can read them quickly and then what to decide to yet.
This method of unhauling and sorting can go quickly or take more time depending on what books you want to part with. Usually, I try to set a numerical goal and then go from there. If I find I still didn’t meet my quota at the end of sorting, then I’ll pull books from my maybe pile.
Declutter Style #2: Konmari
A couple of years ago I documented a blog post about my experience with the Konmari method. It’s an approach to decluttering based on Japanese values in order to surround yourself with items that spark joy. Basically, you go through various items and ask yourself, “Does this spark joy?”. If it doesn’t then it’s something you should get rid of. It’s definitely a time-consuming method since you have to reflect on each individual object. I did this method not only with my books but also my clothes, etc. Overall this method took a few weeks to complete.
This method is not for everyone and I found you really have to be dedicated to doing some hardcore cleaning. But I will say that the reflective nature of Konmari definitely helps you to identify your shopping habits and try to fix them.
Declutter Style #3: Re-Organizing While Unhauling
Several years I took it upon myself to re-organize my book collection alphabetically and then unhaul books at the same time. That meant starting from scratch; pulling every book off the shelf and then finding a way to re-sort them neatly onto the shelves. Unlike method number one, didn’t sort them into stacks and instead alphabetized them while taking inventory of what owned. The same goes for trying to organize them in various styles such as colors or by genre. Granted this method was kind of chaotic and I ran into small obstacles along the way, but somehow I managed to figure it all out.
The nice thing about this method was I was able to refresh my memory about what series I owned and/or was currently collecting. I could see what series I started, what series I left unfinished, even what books I wanted to put into storage so I could focus on backlist reads. Depending on big the bookshelf is this will take a lot of time.
What are some ways you organize/clean up your bookish collection? Do have them cataloged? What ways have you decluttered that you’ve found helpful? Share your thoughts in the comment section below!
This is all great advice and I think you raise a good point in mentioning that some methods actually get you to think more about how you acquired all this stuff in the first place…key! 🙂
I like thinking about the fact that, just because I’m parting with a book doesn’t mean it won’t find another awesome reader…perhaps one even better suited for that book!
True! I used to feel so bad about giving away books, but I realized I want to give them to someone else that might enjoy the story more than I did. It definitely gets you to think bout shopping habits.