Italian philosopher Umberto Eco (1932–2016) allegedly owned more than 30,000 books. Eco’s library in Milan, where he spent most of his life, was filled to the brim with hardcovers and paperbacks.
Author of more than 40 books, Eco did his fair share of research. But he also liked to admit that he had read only a small number of the books he owned. In a 2007 bestseller, Lebanese American essayist Nassim Nicholas Taleb popularized this biographical fact with the term “anti-library,” which has since become a widespread symbol of intellectual humility.
