“Tsundoku:” Collecting Books … And Never Reading Them

As you self-quarantine due to coronavirus, now might be the time to break your book hoarding habit and — finally — make a dent in that collection.

By Lara McCaffrey

Now is your chance to finish reading all nine Game of Thrones books or David Foster Wallace’s infamously long tome, Infinite Jest.

It’s likely most Americans will be self-quarantining for the next few months in order to contain the spread of the COVID-19 virus. For many of us, that means a lot of time spent indoors and not necessarily much to do.

But here’s an idea: Why not crack into that pile of books that’s been staring menacingly at you from your shelves for the last few years? 

During happier times, you purchased these intriguing titles from various bookstores, only to let them gather dust due to a lack of time and patience. 

You’re not the only person who does this. Buying books and not reading them is so commonplace there’s even a word in the Japanese language dedicated to this phenomenon.

It’s called “tsundoku” and it translates to “leaving a book unread after buying it, typically piled up with other unread books.”

Let’s break the word “tsundoku” down to its roots. “Tsun” originates from the word “tsumu” which means “to pile up,” according to an article in Considerable. “Nami” means wave (think “tsunami,” which means “the piling of waves”). Add the word for “to read,” “doku,” and you get “piling up of books.”

Although not a new concept — the word was used as early as 1879 in Japan — tsundoku has now reached a point in time when it doesn’t just relate to actual physical hard (or soft) copy books. Audio books, e-books, even newspapers and magazines, also count. 

“Don’t get me started on my Kindle backlog. I have around 500 sitting in the cloud from daily/monthly deals,” one person on Reddit wrote. ”I still fully intend on reading them all.”

Having a ton of titles to read on your to-do list, no matter if they are physically piling up or digitally, can take a toll on your mental health. You might have so many books they’re taking up space in your apartment, or you might experience a wave of anxiety every time you scroll through your Kindle.

But not all practitioners of tsundoku think it’s a bad thing.

“I do not suffer from [tsundoku]. I revel in it,” wrote one person on Reddit. 

Another user mused:

“Buying books is a therapeutic technique for me; going into a bookstore and feeling comforted and like I have humanity's knowledge at my fingertips is a pretty sweet experience.”

Author and statistician Nassim Nicholas Taleb introduced readers to the concept of an “anti-library” in his 2007 book The Black Swan, using Italian writer Umberto Eco’s 30,000-book collection as an example. 

Eco didn’t have the time to read every book, but found that surrounding himself with this massive collection reminded him of all the things he didn’t know and his potential to learn more.

“Read books are far less valuable than unread ones,” Taleb wrote. “You will accumulate more knowledge and more books as you grow older, and the growing number of unread books on the shelves will look at you menacingly. Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books.”

Whether you’re ashamed of your book stash or not, tsundoku might reveal interesting facets of your personality, according to Psychology Today.

If you happen to be an avid reader, this might indicate a high intelligence level and that you’re an overachiever, or just a bibliophile (a person that loves books).

It might also mean that you’re either an optimist or you lack self-control. 

“When you look at your stack of unread books, you see future opportunity and benefits versus a failure of self-control at the time of purchase, or faulty personal time-management skills,” the article noted.

Regardless of your overall time management skills, with coronavirus-fueled self-quarantining upon us, you now have plenty of time to start chipping away at your tsundoku hoarding habits, one page at a time. 

Think of it this way: You might come out of quarantine both smarter, and with more space your shelves for even MORE books.

LARA MCCAFFREY IS A CALIFORNIA-BASED WRITER WITH BYLINES IN PSYCHOLOGY TODAY, SAN DIEGO CITYBEAT, OUT THERE PODCAST, AND MORE. WHEN SHE'S NOT WRITING, SHE ENJOYS ANXIETY CLEANING HER APARTMENT.

More OK Whatever