The reading life, the reading death

This has been going around lately:

The usual response is That’s so depressing! But I dunno — I think most devoted (obsessive?) readers understand that the world doesn’t value books the way we value books. It’s nice when someone’s collection passes into the hands of people who treasure it, but that’s a rare thing and I certainly don’t expect anything of the kind to happen with my books. And besides, I like to think of it this way: