Ways I have attempted to organize my bookshelf*

*Ordered from most to least efficient

1. Alphabetical, regardless of book category.

2. Book Catagory (poetry, style guide, philosophy, etc.) then alphabetical.

3. Publication Date (first, not most recent reprint or publication of most recent addition[for books containing introductions not found in previous editions]).

4. Publishing House (imprints fall in line alphabetically behind larger house).

5. Class for which work was purchased (Only worked at school and even then only for part of portable library).

6. Biographically (problematic because I do not know why I own a copy of Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do : The Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in Our Free Country.)

7. How impressive would I seem at a party if I casually mentioned having read it? (Most to Least.)

8. Brilliance of opening line. This method falls flat unless you are working only with novels and short stories.

9. Mental Illness/Major Vice that served as author's undoing. (ex. Hemingway, Burroughs, and Thompson: Guns; Poe: Mournful, never-ending remembrance...and liver failure; Woolf: pocket full of rocks [so far, she's there by herself])This method is wholly ineffective when the author is still alive and has no known addictions.

10. My own raging jealousy.