The Error World

December 1, 2008
“I have built up a stamp collection I can barely afford,” Garfield confesses, “and it has brought me to the brink of ruin.” Yet despite a significant amount of autobiographical candor, his story doesn't quite deliver the emotional wallop promised in those opening lines. His youthful enthusiasm for stamp collecting, as well as the rediscovery of that passion in his mid-40s, when he has the income to buy the stamps he always dreamed about owning as a boy, are richly detailed. The few passages depicting the personal consequences of that pursuit, however, are too detached. Several digressions into the history of stamps and stamp collecting slow the narrative, which picks up energy only when Garfield returns to his most intimate interest—his focus on collecting only rare stamps that contain printing errors, for example, or tracking down the young girl who won a design competition he entered as a young boy decades ago. Garfield hits upon some interesting psychological questions about the nature of collecting all sorts of material objects, but it often feels like he is writing around the heart of his story.

Starred review from March 1, 2009
Garfield ("Mauve: How One Man Invented a Color That Changed the World") wittily recounts his boyhood obsession with stamp collecting. Like other collectors, he took it into adulthood and sought out the most valuable specimens. Later, he abandoned his passion, moving on to a more mature, collection-free phase of his life. A delight for philatelists everywhere.L.M.

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