Writing on/in your books?

[aabbcc]

When you read your own books, do you tend to underline sentences, mark chapters, write your own thoughts in the margains, and thus intentionally over the time give some kind of your own 'artistic' input in the book? Or, on the contrary, you avoid making any kinds of marks on your own book, even light underlining with pencil, out of some 'respect' (couldn't think of another word ) for the book?

[Pensive]

Nope, I am too lazy for that. Only sometimes I copy if there is something very interesting into a diary but that too disturbs my reading pace so I try to avoid it as much as possible.

[PeterL]

There have been a few times, maybe four, when I marred a book in that fashion. I don't see any reason for it, except when it clarifies something in the book.

[kiz_paws]

I am very guilty of this practice.... but I like to be able to find a passage of particular note FAST!

However, though I am guilty of it -- I bought a used copy of Hard Times and someone had obviously been studying it in a classroom setting (by the nature of the notes in the margins, kinda gave it away). This book was very distracting for me to read -- because I just couldn't ignore what the previous person had scrawled all over the place...

[Tersely]

I never write in my personal books. Usually I'm at home so if I want to remember something or look a word up, there's a scrap of paper to do it on. College books are a different story. I don't highlight, but I do put little notes in the margins. I like notes.

[Virgil]

I am very guilty of this practice.... but I like to be able to find a passage of particular note FAST!

Guilty? Why guilty if you own the book. I proudly mark up the books I own, whether highlihgting an excellent passage or an important spot. And I crosslink it by writing on the inside of the back blank page, a particular page number and a note. I do this in pencil. I do this for several reasons. One like Kiz says to easily find a passage, two highlight themes that keep coming up so I can detect a pattern, and three for beautifully written passages that I would like to go back to. Geez, all my college professors had notes in their books. Why would you not want to? I will go back and read important works, so I want to know what I was thinking on the first read.

[Etienne]

I take notes on papers for certain books (mostly for nice passages), and sometimes I underline certain passages in my favorite books, so that's usually never in the first read of a book. That's for literature, for philosophy, I use both notebooks which then refers to the book where underlining, notes, etc. are present.

[Rogers_68]

If something gets my attention I'll write in the book or underline it. I don't mind marked up books.

[Alexei]

I never write in my books I keep thinking I am ruining them this way. It's silly because I love it when I find an old book it was written on. I always read the notes carefully, I think this way I am going to learn something about the person who had used the book before me.

[annakarina]

If I'm studying a book for college, I'll sometimes photocopy a few pages and scribble on those. My pet hate is people who write on library books - it's so disrespectful and really distracting for other readers.

[Kafka's Crow]

Most of my books are in Adobe Acrobat format and I write notes, underline stuff etc freely. I try not to write on paper books, and mark only the more difficult books. I once had a first edition copy of Finnegans Wake and I thoroughly annotated it using Adaline Glasheen's A Census of Finnegans Wake:
http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi...sheenFinnegans

[amalia1985]

I always do that, I admit. It's a habbit I picked up in university, and it has remained ever since. Furthermore, I need to perform that "ritual" for my classes.

[Nossa]

I only write notes on a sticky note and stick it on the top of the page. I hardly write anything on the page itself.

[Rogers_68]

I have a friend who was once my English professor and she encourages writing in books (so long as you own it, of course), whether academic or recreational. To her it means that the reader is engaging with the book and not just skimming through it.

[Annamariah]

I just CAN'T write on my books, not to mention drawing on them. The only exceptions were the exercise books at school, in which were supposed to write anyway. So I did the exercises, and since the book was already "spoiled", I also drew on them and underlined nice words and stuff like that But I do feel bad if there is a mistake in a school book I would never write on otherwise, because of course I have to correct that mistake so that I don't accidentally learn it and give a wrong answer in an exam, yet writing on the book still feels awful.

I guess it's just some sort of respect towards the books. I couldn't imagine burning a book, no matter how boring or just bad it was.