Ex Libris...

This article about bookplates in the Yale Alumni Magazine was linked from Library Stuff recently. It's an interesting read, even if it gets a bit tough on ereaders toward the end (somebody has to, I suppose...). I rarely wrote in any of my many books growing up, and certainly wouldn't now. Working in a seconds/hurts book store for many years I saw lots of bookplates and inscriptions, and I see them here and there in yard sale and junk shop finds. On some level I suppose it's an interesting bit of metadata - these stamps instantly humanize an item, force you to realize its experiences prior to or outside of your own.

Why am I rambling about this? I'm consistently making bookplate notes in the LibraryThing records I'm creating for Jefferson Library - mostly about George Wythe's and the Library of Congress 1815 bookplates. Thomas Jefferson initialed his books' signatures, from what I understand usually at signatures I and T, for 'T'homas 'J'efferson (there being no 'J' in Latin). Interestingly, as I'm making my way through the 1806 Wythe bequest to Jefferson, very few books seem to be initialed by TJ. Some have posited that he did not have the time to initial the books while on leave from the presidency. My supervisor at Jefferson Library, Endrina, suggests that perhaps it was more out of deference to his mentor and law tutor that TJ opted not to initial the books he kept from Wythe. I like that theory. He kept only a fraction of the titles, and judging by his proclivity for list-making and note-taking that even I've picked up on in my short time interning at Jefferson Library, I find it hard to believe that Jefferson simply fell short of time to initial those books.

So anyway, do you adorn your favorite titles with 'Ex Libris ______', sign at the sigs, or, I suppose nowadays, drop a DOI (digital object identifier)?