Any book lover would know that going to a bookstore can be a struggle, especially when there are a ton of books that would pique one's interest and yet one doesn't have the means to buy them all. But not everyone who loves books actually loves reading them. That is, some love books only for the sake of owning them. This is what was called bibliomania.
“Bibliomania is the overwhelming compulsion to own books, not so much as to inform oneself as to possess them and feast one’s eyes on them.” The bibliomaniac was interested above all in editions, and bindings, either old or fine. These interests were, in essence, a disease of the mind, a futile, absurd, and ultimately self-destructive obsession.
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