Habent sua fata libelli.
– Terentianus Maurus, De Litteris, De Syllabis, De Metris
“Books have their own fates” (Benjamin 492n2). Walter Benjamin references Terentianus Maurus’s classical aphorism in his 1931 essay Unpacking My Library. As the full latin phrase “Pro captu lectoris habent sua fata libelli,” or “Books have their own fates according to the capacity of the reader,” Maurus’s statement speaks to the independence a text acquires as it moves through the minds of readers and through time. However, for Benjamin – for the book collector:
Not only books but also copies of books have their fates. And in this sense, the most important fate of a copy is its encounter with him, with his own collection. (487)
To Benjamin, this phrase extends to the physical object of the book itself – the individual copy of a text. Within our collections, the value of our books is not just their functional value – not just in the words or ideas contained within its pages – but rather, the collector “studies and loves them as the scene, the stage of their fate” (Benjamin 487). As such, the book is a testament to its own creation and movement through time – its yellowing pages, bookmarked pages, hastily scribbled marginalia as affectionate symbols of the book’s journey to your bookshelf.
Devoted to exploring and discussing the physicality of the book and its impact on the reader’s understanding of text, ENG 407: Shelf Life was an English seminar at the University of Oregon in Spring 2025, taught by Professor Mai-Lin Cheng. Meeting at 10:00 AM on Tuesdays and Thursdays within PLC, the course sought to investigate the book as an object.
The course Shelf Life asks how books matter as books, as material and cultural objects not only containers for text. Shelf Life explores the meaningful relationship between a text and its material instantiation. The double entendre of the title Shelf Life refers both to the material places where books are often housed and to the physical, social, and political contexts that may lead to a book expiring, whether that is due to the fragility of its medium – such that the book can no longer be read – or the perceived danger of its context – such that the book is banned.
– Professor Cheng
Students of Shelf Life created and critiqued art projects, learned how to mend paper, wrote display labels for rare books, and explored libraries and conservation labs. Shelf Life also mixed a variety of reading material such as biography, history, theory, artist monographs and interviews, autobiographical essays, fiction, and comic books. Within Shelf Life, students engaged with the concept of the book as an object through these unique and active learning activities and materials, encouraging playfulness and creativity with this theoretical approach to the book.
This website serves as a digital archive of what was accomplished within the duration of this course. Explore the course themes:
As well as the main course activities:
As the digital world becomes more prominent within our daily lives and media consumption – returning to the physical book as a site for analysis and discussion becomes more relevant than ever.
Sources:
Benjamin, Walter. Unpacking My Library. 1931. Translated by Harry Zohn, ERIS, 2022.
Cheng, Mai-Lin. Syllabus for Shelf Life. Spring 2025, University of Oregon.