“Retired Teacher’s Impressive 64-Year Book Reading Record”
Retired Teacher’s Passion for Books Leads to a Lifetime Collection
A retired Turkish teacher, Serif Demiröz, has been collecting books for over six decades, amassing an impressive library of countless works on various topics, including religion, astronomy, sociology, history, psychology, philosophy, and world classics.
He claims his interest in books began when he read “The Bottom of the Aegean” while in the fifth grade of primary school in 1959. His fascination with astronomy also started from a book, “Journey to the Moon,” when he was twelve years old.
Demiröz’s passion for books has led him to value them over money, stating, “A 10-page book made of straw paper is more important and more valuable than money in terms of value … A book is the brother of the brain, [and] it is the friend of the mind.”
His first library was a lemon chest, which he created when he was a student because he could not afford to buy one. He worked as a waitress and in a forest nursery to save up enough money to build a small closet and start filling it with books. Later, as a teacher, he was finally able to build a more extensive library.
Demiröz hopes to enlarge his library even further and considers his collection to be his best legacy to his four children and grandchildren. He wants them to follow their own path but also hopes that his books will inspire and guide them. He concludes by saying, “Let the next generation evaluate my books well, let them say, let’s go the way he went. I want that.”
