Arranging books

I spent time Friday trying to organize some of my books on shelves in my room, office and elsewhere. I've been thinking about how to do it for a while -- how to categorize books, where to locate the books in various categories, and then, within the categories, how to organize them -- Topically? Alphabetically by author and then title? Alphabetically by author and then chronologically? Or by connecting characters? Or maybe a completely chronological approach?

I wound up using the alphabetical/alphabetical approach for the most part for fiction (the "comfort" books in my room are the exception) and a topical approach for the non-fiction categories. I imagined the fiction books being able to talk to each other this way -- books from different times and places able to enter into conversation -- who knows what new form of story might emerge? It may not be much of a benefit to the newer books -- they've been able to absorb and be in conversation with those that came before them already. But for the older books it may be a wonderful revelation. Imagine Grendel from Beowulf wandering through the various dimensional worlds of Flatland and then emerging in Achebe's Things Fall Apart. Or Hurston's Janie sharing her story with James's The Ambassadors. Edith Wharton and Virginia Woof can compare and contrast the lives of women before and after the Great War.

Since finishing, I've been wrestling with the urge to go get all the other books I have in storage -- in boxes and bins under beds, in closets, and in various spaces -- out and on shelves so they, too, can take part. I am resisting, and I need to resist -- there's no room for them all. But I hear them calling "Let me out! Set me free" . . . they want to be a part of the conversation as well.