How many books have you read in your life?

[pgrmdave]

Well, I got rid of a lot of my books when we moved six years ago when I was in eighth grade. I kept about 1/4 of them and I got rid of about 700. Those were just my books, though. My mother ran a daycare for children out of our house for five years, and I read all the children's books she had. Since then, I've read quite a number of books, easily 2-3 hundred (my reading slowed down considerably when i got into high school and started focusing on many other things).

[ronthepon]

I've been reading ever since I learnt how to

Do booklets count? They'd push me well over the K.

[pgrmdave]

Another question - if I read two novels contained within a single textbook for school, is that one book or two? How about books that are compilations of short stories? Are they many books or one book? Is the book the physical paper, or the story?

[Tormod]

Definitions...I have several Nortons but none of them contain complete novels. But they do contain complete plays...does that count...

I think if you're past 1K, you know it.

[Spiked Blood]

Between the ages 8 to 14 I read six books every week. Six was the library limit for my age or it would have been more. Those six years alone see me well passed the 1k mark, encroaching onto 2k.

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by pgrmdave

Another question - if I read two novels contained within a single textbook for school, is that one book or two? How about books that are compilations of short stories? Are they many books or one book? Is the book the physical paper, or the story?

I knew this was a tough one the second I hit Submit to enter the poll. I used to read encyclopedias and how does one count that!? (interrobang )
By last night I boiled it down to asking myself "how many words have I read!?" (interrogbang).
I still haven't voted, but reading the replies is convincing me I have read an indeterminate amount of books beyond 901.

[CraigD]

This is a fun and interesting poll!

A shortcoming of its question, though, is that, to a large degree, it’s equivalent to “how old are you?” A 16-year-old who has read 100 books is clearly a more dedicated reader than a 50-year-old who has read 300, but that’s not reflected by this poll.

It’d be interesting to try another poll on the number of books each of us read each year.

Even better would be a count of words read per year, though, at least for me, this would be difficult to calculate. Although I have pretty good records of what I’ve read since about 1/1/97, and a couple of datapoints counting how many books I’ve owned from the several times I’ve donated them to libraries, I’ve not kept records on the length of each book, and find I can’t reliably distinguish novels from longer short-stories I’ve read – though it’s easier since I started reading mostly e-books around 2001

[pgrmdave]

Another question (even though I already voted): What about rereading a favorite? I know that I read White Fang at least twice a year from second grade through sixth - does that count as one book or ten? Does rereading War and Peace count the same as reading The Foot Book to my little sister every night for a few years?

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by pgrmdave

Another question (even though I already voted): What about rereading a favorite? I know that I read White Fang at least twice a year from second grade through sixth - does that count as one book or ten? Does rereading War and Peace count the same as reading The Foot Book to my little sister every night for a few years?

Curiouser and curiouser. While part of me wants to say re-reads don't count, another part of me has socked that part in the kisser and said *we* must count re-reads.

I am not much closer to a realistic count, but the endeavor has prompted an anecdote of the bookish kind. To whit, during one of my stints as a student, I took a course entitled 'Individualized Reading', wherin students chose any book, read it, and turned in a report. The knick was, it was the number of pages that determined the majority of the credit. Most the students - well all but me - chose short books and so had to write a lot of reports; they somehow argued it was easier!?
I saw an advantage in long books because it meant fewer reports and it presented an opportunity to read long books I otherwise had no time for. I remember three of the five I read:
We, by Charles Lindbergh, Dune by Frank Herbert, and a biography of Ben Franklin by Forgot D. Name.

[Jay-qu]

Good points Craig and Dave, I am thinking that I have read maybe ~100, but including re-reading it would bump it up a bit..