Lectures began on Monday, and as I write this I have had at least one lecture on each of this semester's modules and received a copy of the module's study guide.

This means, now I know what the core textbooks are, that I've been buying books. I've accumulated a modest collection of books over the years, ranging from children's fiction to adult fiction to philosophy to technical self-study books. Some names from my bookshelves include Orwell, Nietzsche, Byron, Pratchett, Thich Nhat Hanh, and the Dalai Lama.

Textbooks are always the most expensive to buy. Not because of the cost of producing them, but the premium put on the information in them. It can't help that there is an almost captive market for university textbooks: if your course requires certain books it's quite prudent to get hold of a copy of each (although sometimes you can get by without them).

The internet has done wonders for freely spreading information, but still, highly academic topics can be hard to find, and expensive when you do. The various academic journals are good examples of this, as they charge you to view their archives (I don't know how expensive journal subscriptions are, I've not had to pay one, but I can't imagine them being cheap).

I can't help but wonder, why is knowledge so expensive?

As for myself, I like owning books, perhaps it's something to do with reinforcing my self-image of being an intelligent person, but on a practical level I often refer back to technical books and enjoy rereading good books. That's why I prefer to buy my books, rather than borrow them from the library, although I've taken to using the second hand bookshop instead of buying new.

Finally, the book buying that prompted this post amounted to £160, with books ranging from £5 from the second hand bookshop to £60 from amazon.com and shipped to the UK (the shipping charge hurt, but I wanted it quickly so I could study from it)