research paper about books

The Man Who Loved Book Too Much: Compare/Contrast Essay

The Man Who Loved Book Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett is a book based on a true story where she explores the world of book lovers/collectors and tries to comprehend the driving force behind their obsession. Two very important characters of this writing are Ken Sanders; the book collector and dealer and John Charles Gilkey; The book thief; both of the characters are massive book lovers, passionate about owning books and creating an extraordinary collection. But each of them has some similarities and differences in the way they love books and in their moral characters.

John Charles Gilkey and Ken Sanders have a natural difference in their behavior, conversation and body language. When Allison Hoover Bartlett went to visit Gilkey in the prison curious about his motivation behind his crime of stealing books she realized the man has a lot of conflict in himself. Although he knows the fact that he did fraud to get stolen items yet he did not consider his stealing as a crime because he loved books. Gilkey had lack of moral sense which reflects when he justifies his stealing as it is not “fair” that he did not have money to afford rare books. He uses words like “got” instead of “steal” and “doing that” instead of “theft” makes it clear that he has no guilt about his crime rather he has his own way to justify his actions. Bartlett also noticed inconsistency in Gilkey’s behavior when she talked with her. Gilkey said “I want to stop committing crime it’s not worth it.” But seconds later confessed that it was not possible for him to resist the temptation “Then, there’s the excitement of having the books in your hand”. Also when Gilkey describes about his family, childhood and future plan Bartlett notices the big gaps in between his stories which altogether made no sense. Sanders, on the other hand, is a confident man who tells his stories without any ambiguity. When he tells stories about his encounters with book thieves he is going on and on as he is true to himself; “he did not need to hesitate”. It is clear that Sanders has a strong sense of morality. Although he is a businessman, a dealer, he cared about fellow book dealers. When a juvenile boy comes to him with a rare book who does not know it’s worth, he does not try to fool him, rather he sells the book to him and takes some commission. He is passionate about books but doesn’t compromise his morality for the sake of lust.

In the stories of childhood life people may find a lot of clues about the person’s nature. Childhood environment, relations, idols - tell a lot about the person and his or her grown up character. In this thought the writer investigated about Gilkeys’s childhood. She came to know about his childhood superhero Richie Rich and how he idolized him. Richie Rich was a fantasy character of a child who was very wealthy and sophisticated. He always got whatever he wanted without doing any hard work. Gilkey’s admiration towards Richie Rich explains his characteristics of desperately wanting to be in possession of expensive assets without even working hard for them. As a child Sanders was also attracted to books and comics. He walked miles, studied hard to get what he wanted unlike Gilkey who thought it was okay was to take was he wants. He knew life was not always easy and fair but he has to stick to doing what is right and is more important. Sanders life style reflects his choice of hero Spiderman. He respects the fact that Spiderman is a super hero yet he has problems and difficulties in life. In the Spiderman comic people seem to have misconception about him sometimes even hate

him but Spiderman did what he had to do to fight evil. Similarly Sanders follows his own rule and goes beyond to do what is right no matter what people say about him.

The story “The Man Who Loved Book Too Much” reveals that sanders belonged to an educated family. His father was a knowledgeable man who loved to collect books. The genes ran through the family and Sanders inherited the passion in books from his childhood. On the other hand, Gilkey, somehow was not fortunate enough to be raised in a family where he could learn to differentiate between right and wrong. From his tales about his family it is clear that stealing was not bad for them rather they concentrated more on profit and loss of any act. He lived according to his parent’s views and he then became even less moral than them. He was not punished or educated for his wrong acts in his childhood which made an impact on his moral sense when he grew up.

Besides books Gilkey also had a hunger for a luxurious life. He is always jealous of wealthy people and desperately wants to be rich. It is very important for him to reach a position where he wants the rare books to show people he is higher in society. Although he did not have any plan to work hard for acquiring riches, in his mind he is very vindictive and fells it is not fair that rich people have so much. And this way he justifies all his fraud and crimes. Unless In a bad situation he did not even plan to sell the valuable books he stole, rather he continues to steal to maintain his lifestyle .All his life he is waiting to build an empire and show that to people to get admiration. In contrast to Gilkey, Sanders had no desire for luxury or wealth. He is a hardworking man from an early age. As a business man he has love and affection for his fellow dealers and as a member of ABAA security team he was very strict about the ethics and laws. Although he had money problems all his life he refused the position of treasurer of ABAA. This reflects the characteristic of Sanders that he is not a person who has hunger for money or luxury rather he gives much more value to ethics and morals.

There are many differences in the characters of Sanders and Gilkey but one thing that connects them is the mad love of books. Both of them have a great craving for books especially for rare books. More than the content in it they care more about the historical background of the books. It is evident when Gilkey declared the book “Lolita” as disgusting but wants to own. Similarly Sanders also wanted the unique copy of the book in which Edward Abbey and R. Crumb switched their autograph just for the sake of a little fun. More than books themselves it is the historical background of them that make these two people so passionate about collecting rare books.

Although Sanders and Gilkey are both quite intelligent and knowledgeable, the way they use knowledge is different. They both know a lot about the world of rare books, the originals, the unique ones, the valuable ones they were always well informed and up to

date. They can tell from the book’s cover, crispiness, essence of what it is worth and so it can be predicted that in case of books both of them are very knowledgeable person. Also, both of them were technologically advanced. After joining ABAA Sanders ordered to setup an email system, book database and an online discussion as he found out that technology was the effective way to stop crime by alerting more and more people in a very short time. On the other hand Gilkey uses random person’s credit card number to place his order for books. He waits long enough to use the credit card numbers of the customers so that they cannot be traced back to him, which shows his passion comes before his intelligence.

Overall, exploring the characteristic of Ken Sanders and John Gilkey it can be said that they are two people radically different from each other with only one string – ‘the profound love for books’ attaching them.

By William Germano

William Germano is dean of the faculty of humanities and social sciences at Cooper Union for

the Advancement of Science and Art. A longer version of this essay was presented as a talk at the

annual meeting of the Association of American University Presses this summer.

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By Your Name

Your name is a student of University of Temple. This work is done for a course. The essay is written from Allison Hoover Bartlett’s novel, The Man Who Loved Books Too Much. Two characters from the book were compared by subject pattern. John Charles Gilkey and Ken Sanders were taken for the compare/contrast demonstration.