To Have and to Hold
A Veritable Vello-Maniac
In this chapter Phillip Blom discusses three different men that inherit an obsession with the collecting of books and they are referred to as bibliomaniacs. These three men all deal with their obsessions in different ways, some negatively and one positively but all have in common, the feeling of incompleteness through lack of written and or printed text they have for their personal libraries.
Sir Thomas Phillips' goal was to collect 'every copy of every book in the world.' He devoted his life to obtaining everything that was printed or written by hand and create a grand library. However, Phillips' collection grew far to large and during his move to the Thirlestaine House it came to be known that he owned 20,000 manuscripts and 30,000 books. Since Sir Phillip did not what to relinquish control of his library that when he died in 1872 his collection was to be auctioned and there are still sales on these priceless words.
Following Sir Thomas Phillips' passion for book came the evil of the hobby, the evil that made men like Don Vincente a librarian in a monastery who stole books from his own place of employment only to disappear then reappear in Barcelona selling these books for money and withholding valuable ones. In 1836 the only copy of the first copy of a the first printed book by Lambert Palmart in Spain. This lead Don to bid on the rare find only to be outbid by Augustino Patxot. Three days later Don burned down Patxot's shop and was found murdered inside. This lead to murders around the country over books. The Furs Ordinations de Valencia was found in Don's apartment. After all of that, Don found out that that was not the only copy which angered him greatly and eventually lead to him being executed. Greed.
Lastly, a more kind and sane man to have a passion for books was Benjamin Walters. He states 'every passion boarders on choas' he expresses the sensual and philosophical sides of his collection. He is intrigued by the mind of the collector and following that, people were fascinated by him.
The Middle Hill Estate
Benjamin Walters Library Card
The Tower of Babel Library
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