Marginalia

Marginalia isn't just for the inane ramblings of pretentious readers or the scribblings of bored school boys.  It is a method of communication that has been practiced for centuries.  The marginalia of several authors and critics have been published as books in their own right.

With the advent of Kindle and electronic books, the habit is in danger of disappearing.  I did notice that my Kindle offers the feature to highlight passages and comment on them.  These comments join a cloud of similar comments from similar readers online.  I have the option to choose to read my ebooks with these comments enabled.  Somehow the feature does not have the same charm as classic marginalia.  The "in-line" nature of the comments is also somewhat distracting, though some methods of classic marginalia do involve the mark-up of passages "in-line."

What is marginalia, Nick?  You may be asking yourself that.

According to Webster:
mar·gi·na·lia noun plural \ˌmär-jə-ˈnā-lē-ə\

Definition of MARGINALIA
1: marginal notes or embellishments (as in a book)
2: nonessential items <the meat and marginalia of American politics — Saturday Review>

In very simple terms, marginalia is someone writing in the margins of their books.  Historically, this has been happening for a very long time.  It can be as simple as a student highlighting passages in his text book (a specialized form of marginalia known as scholia) or a reader penning his thoughts and critique in the margins as he reads.

This latter form is particularly note-worthy.  Reading a book with this type of marginalia is like watching a DVD with commentary.  Often times, this will be that readers first time with the book and you can watch as that person's opinions change and mature through the course of reading the book.

Edgar Allen Poe published a number of his musings, reflections, and fragmental poetry in a volume titled "Marginalia."

Voltaire penned an entire book in the margins of another while he was in prison, due a lack of paper.

Several authors have written "Annotated" volumes, their commentary of other authors works, with passages that could be described as marginalia.  Of course I'm a fan of Asimov's Annotated series of books.  As was Henry.

Perhaps most famously, Samuel T. Coleridge was renown for his habit of marginalia and a number books edited with his marginalia have been published.  He was a fairly serious opium addict and some of these passages are very enlightening into the mindset of the barely lucid.

I would post a scan of one of Henry's mark-ups but sadly I do not have those books any more.  He was very much interested in the concept of human love.  I used to own a copy of Malory's Le Morte De Arthur in which he had heavily annotated.  He had extreme difficult understanding the concepts of love as described in those pages.  Particularly troubling to him was the story of The Lady of Astolat.

I remember this in particular not because he was troubled at The Lady's death, but at how he envied her capacity for emotion.  No, he was troubled that he had never felt even a fraction of the love and devotion that Elaine had felt.  It was a sensation he found so alien and so enviable at the same time.

He often spoke of emotion as a spectrum of perception.  Just as some peoples' vision is more keen than others, perhaps some people experience vivid or muted emotions.  In this metaphor, Henry described himself as emotionally blind, unable to experience the vivid and moving colors of emotion that others cherished.

His was a world without light.

I remember that comment in his marginalia in particular.  "Mine is a world without light."