Tsundoku

Short description: Term for buying books but not reading them

A stack of books found after cleaning a room

Tsundoku (積ん読) is the phenomenon of acquiring reading materials but letting them pile up in one's home without reading them.^[1]^[2]^[3]^[4] The term is also used to refer to books ready for reading later when they are on a bookshelf.

The term originated in the Meiji era (1868–1912) as Japanese slang.^[4] It combines elements of the terms tsunde-oku (積んでおく, "to pile things up ready for later and leave"), and dokusho (読書, "reading books"). There are suggestions to use the word in the English language and include it in dictionaries like the Collins Dictionary.^[4]

The American author and bibliophile A. Edward Newton commented on a similar state in 1921.^[5]

In his 2007 book, The Black Swan, Nassim Nicholas Taleb coined the term "antilibrary", which has been compared with tsundoku.^[6]

References

↑ Brooks, Katherine (19 March 2017). "There's A Japanese Word For People Who Buy More Books Than They Can Actually Read". The Huffington Post. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/theres-a-japanese-word-for-people-who-buy-more-books-than-they-can-actually-read_us_58f79b7ae4b029063d364226.
↑ Tobar, Hector (24 July 2014). "Are you a book hoarder? There's a word for that.". Los Angeles Times. http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-book-hoarding-tsundoku-20140724-story.html.
↑ Gerken, Tom (29 July 2018). "Tsundoku: The art of buying books and never reading them". BBC News. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-44981013.
↑ ^4.0 ^4.1 ^4.2 Crow, Jonathan (24 July 2014). "'Tsundoku', the Japanese Word for the New Books That Pile Up on Our Shelves, Should Enter the English Language". Open Culture. https://www.openculture.com/2014/07/tsundoku-should-enter-the-english-language.html.
↑ Dodson, Steve (February 7, 2008). "A Quote on Bibliomania". http://languagehat.com/a-quote-on-bibliomania/. Retrieved July 24, 2016.
↑ Popova, Maria (2015-03-24). "Umberto Eco's Antilibrary: Why Unread Books Are More Valuable to Our Lives than Read Ones" (in en-US). https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/03/24/umberto-eco-antilibrary/.

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Original source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsundoku. Read more

[huffpost-1] Brooks, Katherine (19 March 2017). "There's A Japanese Word For People Who Buy More Books Than They Can Actually Read". The Huffington Post. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/theres-a-japanese-word-for-people-who-buy-more-books-than-they-can-actually-read_us_58f79b7ae4b029063d364226.

[LAtimes-2] Tobar, Hector (24 July 2014). "Are you a book hoarder? There's a word for that.". Los Angeles Times. http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-book-hoarding-tsundoku-20140724-story.html.

[3] Gerken, Tom (29 July 2018). "Tsundoku: The art of buying books and never reading them". BBC News. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-44981013.

[OpenCulture-4] 4.0 ^4.1 ^4.2 Crow, Jonathan (24 July 2014). "'Tsundoku', the Japanese Word for the New Books That Pile Up on Our Shelves, Should Enter the English Language". Open Culture. https://www.openculture.com/2014/07/tsundoku-should-enter-the-english-language.html.

[5] Dodson, Steve (February 7, 2008). "A Quote on Bibliomania". http://languagehat.com/a-quote-on-bibliomania/. Retrieved July 24, 2016.

[6] Popova, Maria (2015-03-24). "Umberto Eco's Antilibrary: Why Unread Books Are More Valuable to Our Lives than Read Ones" (in en-US). https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/03/24/umberto-eco-antilibrary/.

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Tsundoku

Topic: Philosophy

See also

References