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A friend of mine, vacationing in a sunny climate last winter. mysteriously lost her book on the beach in a moment of inattention. She could not escape the conclusion that the book had been stolen, which was not the sort of thing she had expected at this fashionable resort. Had the book been taken on impulse by another guest, perhaps? Was it a bibliokleptomaniac (such people do exist),1 a casual thief seizing an opportunity, or a transient on the beach who needed a few dollars (or wanted to read the book himself?). Whoever the thief was, my friend felt the way a young neighbour back in Canada did when a classmate stole his latest Harry Potter book. Her book was not priceless or rare, nor was it a masterpiece, but she wanted it back.
The stealing of books, perhaps the most selfish of all forms of theft, has a history that goes back to the beginning of libraries, when books were rare and thus a greater temptation. In the Middle Ages a widely used weapon against book thieves was a curse. Of the many examples that have survived, my favourite is the following curse of uncertain origin:
For him that stealeth a book from this library, let it change into a serpent in his hand and rend him. Let him be struck by palsy and all his members blasted. Let him languish in pain, crying aloud for mercy and let there be no surcease to his agony till he sink to dissolution. Let bookworms gnaw his entrails in token of the Worm that dieth not and when at last he goeth to his Final Punishment, let the flames of Hell consume him for ever and aye.
Other curses of the time included the threat of...