T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan: The problem of half-read books

Why do people write fat books when the chances are that they will not be read fully?

A few days ago, Alaka Basu, one of the most understated intellectuals of our time, grumbled in her usual mild manner on Twitter about the half-read books on her bookshelf. Alaka is a voracious reader and I can well imagine how many of such books there must be in their house.

It is very likely that she is never going to finish reading those books. Her husband, who is an economist, would know how irrational this is - like, you know, having consistently paid double or thereabouts for something all your life.

It is not an uncommon dilemma, though. Anyone who possesses more than a dozen non-fiction books will empathise. Strangely, however, this does not happen much with fiction. Apart from the occasional very bad one, we normally tend to read fiction through to the end even if it is just about passable.

Which raises a puzzle: do authors of non-fiction books write far more than they should, or do we not mind paying around twice the price for the half or so that we consume? Why? Does the fault lie in our stars, Brutus?

Think about it: would an ice-creamwallah give you a double helping knowing you could not finish it? Would you pay double for it and not ask for a half-scoop?

Many such questions arise. For example, what makes non-fiction such that it so deeply underlines the concept of the consumer surplus in economics? Don't second-hand and discounted books underline this further? And why do publishers, who risk so much, prefer fatter to thinner books when they know that it means selling fewer copies because the price is higher?

Or is it that the price elasticity of demand for non-fiction is so low that even a lifetime's experience teaches nothing? Could it be that a high proportion of non-fiction sales actually consist of highly discounted books so that you are, in fact, paying the correct price for them?

Worse, the tendency to read only portion of a book is increasing because of digital downloads which cost less and cause no storage problem. In fact, increasingly the portions that are actually read in the downloaded books are getting smaller.

Maybe a day will come when just chapters can be bought, just like from music albums from which you can buy just one song for a song.

Till death do us part?

Even more inexplicable is the problem of entirely unread books. There is a great deal of impulse buying and I am willing to bet that at least a quarter of the non-fiction books on peoples' shelves - provided they have more than 20 - are entirely unread.

Also, how is it that when people grow old and complain about all manner of things, they rarely gripe about the money they have wasted on books that they only half read or indeed didn't read at all?

Why do people who give away books regularly - like I do - happily discard the ones they have read even though these had given them pleasure? How come they don't give away the ones they have not read even though the probability that they will never read them, or read them only perfunctorily, is one?

I have many books like this. Most of them are reference volumes, full sets of 12-20 volumes each. They are all in mint condition.

One lot, the Transfer of Power documents, bought on a book grant, has been lying largely unopened since 1990. Another set of 12 volumes, Will Durant's Story of Philosophy, has been glanced at perhaps three times since I bought them 2005. I paid C$100 for the entire set at a sale. It was such a great buy that there is no real need to read them, I think. Just possession is enough.

A third set is all of 15 volumes of Collected Works of Sardar Patel that I bought in Ahmedabad for just Rs 2,000. Again, like some other sets I bought for a song, they are barely referred to. Twice in seven years, I think.

Then there are the fat bulky chaps that I have read only in parts or not read at all because I got the gist of the argument halfway through.

They occupy a lot of space, which is a nuisance. They also have to be dusted everyday, which is costly.

But am I going to give them away? No, Sir, never, perish the thought.

Why? Because, just as one does in marriage, one likes to gaze fondly at one's aging follies.

Besides, books aren't reproachful all the time, are they?