Sic Transit Gloria Mundi: Selling Academic Books

I keep meaning to gradually de-accession my huge collection of books, many bought during my years in graduate school. If I work till I'm 65, say (I wish, I wish), I should get rid of about 10% of my books per year. Every now and again, I check the value of a book on Amazon, and think, oh boy, a pretty penny awaits.

For instance, I have this book somewhere.

And this one.

It's so hard to say good-bye to these books. I remember my sense of awe and wonder during those years, along with a panicked feeling that I might never find employment.

Today, however, I realized that my vast collection may, in fact, be mostly worthless. The English Club had a book sale. At the end of the day, a big FREE BOOKS sign was put up.

Many books were donated by a recently-retired colleague. Many of the books he donated were ones Mr. FS and I owned, staples of the graduate student/professor library of days gone by, the days of THEORY. No one wanted the books.

I didn't take them, since we already own them. How do these fare on the open market?


or this?

How depressing! That one doesn't even get a picture! This one was required reading.

Oh, it's all too depressing. But I do need to declutter. The vision (mental only, since I did not participate) of my in-laws getting rid of a 50 year collection of books is so painful. Mr. FS spent his last week in his childhood home packing boxes of books and taking the rejects to Goodwill, which rejected them.

Perhaps it is fate that I picked up this poorly-written tome recently for a quarter.

Strangely, this one seems to be worth more than some of the academic books. I could sell my copy for $2.64.

What lessons should I draw from all this?