From The Common Reader, First series, by Virginia Woolf,The Hogarth Press,London, 1968, eleventh impression. First published 1928.
I bought this book yesterday from Quilters Bookshop. It has been in the window for a few weeks, and it attracted my attention with its beautiful cover design by Vanessa Bell. The book cost me $20.00. It is hardcovered, in perfect condition- you would think no-one had ever opened it- and it brings with it something which has no particular value except to a reader like me, and that is a smell.
Smells can be described. I know this from the study of wine and perfume and coffee. So I will set myself the job of describing this smell. The bass note is somewhat sweet, and somewhat of decay. It has as they would say of wine, high notes. The smell is strongest at the inside edge of the pages, the edge nearest to the binding, so perhaps the smell has something to do with binding materials. It is the smell of age. One of the smells in second hand shops. But this smell has nothing to do with the smell of people- nothing of sweat or grease- it has something to do with being closed, enclosed, and something to do with water. It is a smell you recognise from summer houses, with their shelves of books that no-one opens for years at a time. I notice that the longer the book is open, the less strong the smell is, and if I want to smell it strongly again, which I do, I have to open the book at a new place.
It is a smell which I love.
An ebook does not have a smell.