READING A USED BOOK CAN BE AN INTIMATE EXPERIENCE

first posted on r/books I often visit used bookstores and sometimes the books are marked up—though I try to avoid it since it can be distracting.

Still, sometimes I end up with a book with underlined passages. Some of those times there’s an inscription in the first pages suggesting, for example, that someone gave it as a gift in 1951.

Of those times, a precious few have underlined the same passages that I want to mark myself. In those moments I feel deeply connected to this unknown person across circumstance, space, and time.

And it’s wonderful.