That’s the question that Roger von Oech of Creative Think was asking this week.

For those who aren’t familiar with Roger, he’s the creator of the Creative Whack Pack, the Ball of Whacks (a tool for innovation) and a lot of other cool stuff I’ve meant to review for some time now.

As you might imagine, he’s prone to asking creative questions.

Questions like, for instance, “What does your bookshelf say about your worldview?”

I thought it was an interesting question, so I decided to sit down and ask my bookshelf about it.

Almost immediately, I found a problem.

WHICH bookshelf should I ask? There are the two closest to me, in my studio. There’s one under my bed, 2 small ones and one huge one in my old office/current store room. Another large one in the spare bedroom/astronomy/weight room, the empty one in the living room, or those boxes and boxes stashed under the spare bed make a total of .. well..

…I lost count.

However many there are, they must all be very opinionated, because each and every one of them seems to

have something to say.

All at the same time.

To be honest, they are giving me a headache.

I’m sure you’d be amused by their individual commentaries, but I’m a bit pressed for time, so I’ll settle for relaying the gestalt of their views.

To start off with, they say my worldview is many layered and fractured, and far too complicated to sort out in one blog post. They’ll settle for telling you a bit more about me, personally, in a somewhat disparaging tone.

They want you to know things like how I really should have completed the refinishing job before stacking books back into the antique library case. That I keep promising to get rid of the riff-raff titles, but never do, and that the book on Biblical scholarship REALLY should not be sandwiched between to “Flesh of the Gods” (hush, its an anthropological study) and “1000 Nudes” (ok, that one is exactly what it sounds like.)

Further, they are of the strong opinion that cardboard boxes are NOT suitable as bookshelf brethren, but they rather liked the dresser-drawers I used to use as shelving, mounted on the wall.

They say that I am a packrat. That I believe if I own a book on a subject, I own the knowledge, and one should never turn from knowledge. I value the old, and am in lust with the new. I’m spiritual, I’m technical, I’m fascinated with creativity and imagery and symbolism and cultures. They say that I like things to *look* pretty and neat, but that eventually the stacks of knowledge overwhelm me, and things wind up “wherever”. I like the surreal, whimsy, and a pretense of order.

And so they clamor, and fuss, and look down their stacks at me.

All but one.

The empty shelf over the fireplace is the littlest voice, but the most telling.

It has not yet served as a bookshelf. Cleared off at Christmas to make room for the obligatory nativity set and victorian villages, the regular knick-knacks never got put back in place.

So the shelf waits. Quietly, patiently, smiling, a still quiet voice.

I’ve been thinking that meaningful, attractive, library-bound books would be good there. Books that would impress, enlighten and reveal. A readers-digest condensed version of who I am. Foundational books. Life changing books. The books that find their way into my daily metaphors for life. The books that tell my life stories, even as I tell theirs, over and over again. Classic, eclectic, intellectual whimsy.

The bookshelves like that idea.

I can hear them nattering at other, debating which of their treasures they would give up for the cause, and which ones would need to be replaced with better volumes.

There seems to be only one title they all agree on: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (one with Arthur Rackham illustrations, of course. Collectible leather bound preferred).

Apparently, they feel that if I’m going to go about having profound conversations with my bookcases, it might as well be in a world where such things are not altogether remarkable, and one with pretty pictures.

So here’s my question to you:

What does your bookshelf say about you? About life? About anything? (Oh now, stop groaning. You had to KNOW this was coming.)

And along with what your bookshelf says, I’d like to know *how* it says.

Does it speak with a Scottish accent? Does it use $10 words or colloquialisms talk like a hick? Does it offer you a cup of tea or sniff disdainfully and point out the feather duster?

Leave a comment, write a post, take a picture, do a podcast. I don’t care.

But please give your bookshelf a voice, for it’s own amusement. (and mine).

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MindTWEAK: “Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat:
“We’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.
“You must be,” said the Cat,
“or you wouldn’t have come here.”

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(And if you still haven’t checked out Roger von Oech’s blog?
Check out how *HIS* bookshelf talked back. In full color, yet. Now THAT’s creative.)