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I think the real reason why e-books gave me a sense of unease, though, was not because they lack the appeal of paper as much as the fact that they simply can't be stacked up after reading. I owned an enormous number of books that I had thought I liked and collected, only to realize that I just picked them up for the sake of appearance. I wanted people to see them and be impressed by what a person of depth I was and how thirsty I must have been for knowledge. It's clear now that I wanted to convey to others what a worthy person I was through my books. For that purpose, they absolutely had to be piled up in stacks as I finished reading them. Anyone who sees a pile of books will think that you've read a lot. I felt uneasy about e-books because it would only look like I'd read a single book regardless of how many thousands of works I'd gone through.