How to Use a book

Or, how I came to realize that books were meant to be written in.

Above: marginalia—once a common practice—in a bible from 1577.

Before I was sixteen, any money I earned went towards the purchase of new books. Watching the neighbor’s little kids for a night when I was twelve allowed me one and a half new mass market paperbacks. Mowing a neighbor’s lawn meant a new trade paperback and nearly enough for another mass mar…