LOTR Characters by how they organise their bookshelves

penny-anna:

Frodo: alphabetises his books rigorously, no exceptions

Bilbo: personal & esoteric organisational system that makes sense to no-one except himself (shortly after moving into Bag End Frodo alphabetised them all while Bilbo was away, they did not speak to each other for a week afterwards)

Gimli: alphabetically but by the dwarvish alphabet so no non-dwarves can find any of his books

Legolas: by colour, for the #aesthetic

Merry: roughly by subject matter and then by personal preference within that

Aragorn: has a handy shelf for his most-consulted volumes for when he has to look up something on eg herblore in a hurry, otherwise by subject matter & author

Boromir: by subject matter & author but in practice his books are 90% either ‘history’ or ‘swords’ so essentially by title

Gandalf: does not own any books (or anything aside from a hat & robe & staff let’s be honest), borrows from his friends, returns them 10 years later smelling of pipeweed and distant lands

Pippin: just shoves his books back wherever there’s space when he’s done with them, insists he ‘has them how he likes them’ but in fact can’t find anything

Sam: owns exactly 2 books, both gifts from Bilbo, keeps them on his nightstand within grabbing distance. Post-quest inherited the entire Baggins library & religiously kept it alphabetised, the way Frodo liked it