bearisgray

The textbooks at the school I went to (1947-1959) belonged to the school. They were numbered and issued to us students at the beginning of the year. We were not to mark them up in any way.

I was also not to mark up any of the books that were in my home.

Now that I am "old-er" - and have purchased my own books and I am free to do with them as I wish - I still hesitate to mark them up. (There are a few that have lots of notes and highlighting - but I sort of "take pride" in keeping my books looking like they are still "new".)

Do any of the rest of you still hesitate to mark up your own books?

By the way, I am *not happy* when I see a marked up library book. What the?

greensleeves

my own-yes; those that belong to others-no

Rhonda K

I like to use sticky notes. They work to flag special pages too.

Don’t put the sticky part on any printing as it can remove the printing.

Onebyone

I was taught never to write or mark in book. I don't do it now with the books I own because it looks so tacky, like bite marks on a pencil.

RedGarnet222

It depends on the book. If I am studying and it is my own book, I will. If it is a loan I will not. You see, I need to highlight to get the full importance out of some unfamiliar concept to review it before a test or class. But, I have been know to mark up my own books with lines when a marker is not available.

Chasing Hawk

I don't write or mar my books in anyway. I try not to bend the covers of my paperbacks too much either.
In the strategy books I own for video games I play I use those sticky tabs to mark things I want to look up while playing said video game. Same goes for "instructional books" for sewing, quilting and other hobbies I have. The automotive manuals we have for our trucks are not marked up slips of paper are used to make notes and left where needed in the manuals. Although those manuals do get a bit dirty while working on the trucks.

toverly

I love to mark special passages in my books. No difference if it is paperback or hardback. A simple underline will do.

Tartan

Purchased books I like to keep nice as I turn them into a charity shop after reading them. Study books or my Bible I will underline. I have seen some alterations in library books but it amuses me if someone corrects a typo. If you mark up a library book for any other reason, shame on you!

Mkotch

I don't write in books! I'm a librarian (retired). I sometimes turn pages down, but only if I own the book. I once had to take a library patron to task when I found that he was consistently writing in books we got for him on interlibrary loan from a university library. I think I was pretty polite in speaking with him, but he never used our library again. I was glad! It took a long time to erase all his notes before returning the books.

Onebyone

I use to check out lots of books a month from the local library. I would put a tiny pencil dot on the back page so I would know I had read the book before. After 15 years most of the books had my dot in them. At my job I had a lot of down time and could read on the job but do nothing else like hand sewing.