I first learned about the Commonplace Book from Shuanta Grime’s article, the Commonplace Book Project — An Experiment back in 2019.

Since then, I have kept a commonplace book with me. In fact, I have several now.

A commonplace book is basically a scrapbook where you collect things that fascinate you. It could be quotes, proverbs, poems, letters, recipes, or prayers.

They differ from journals or diaries, which are chronological and introspective.

History of Commonplace Books

People have been keeping them from antiquity, however, they became very popular between the Renaissance and the nineteenth century.

Marcus Aurelius’s “Meditations” is often considered a precursor to the commonplace books, where he recorded his thoughts and quotations.

Erasmus Darwin, a noted physician (and Charles Darwin’s grandfather) kept a commonplace book between 1776 to 1787, which was later used by Charles Darwin.

Erasmus Darwin’s Commonplace Book, pages 58–59: Source: British Museum

In 1685, the English Enlightenment philosopher John Locke suggested a technique for entering proverbs, quotations, ideas, and speeches in commonplace books, which he published as A New Method of Making Common-Place-Books.

John Locke, A New Method of Making Common-Place-Books (London: J. greenwood, 1706), Image Source

He advised arranging material by subject and categories, using such key topics as love, politics, or religion.

John Locke’s double-page index, as printed in the English translation of New Method for Common-Place Books (1706) Image Source

Following the publication of John Locke’s work, many publishers printed empty commonplace books with space for headings and indices to be filled in by the users.

Which is not different to what Ryder Carroll used for the Bullet Journaling method.

By the early eighteenth century, the Commonplace books had become information management devices just like the Evernote and other notes taking apps are for us.

Scientists and other thinkers used the Common Place books in the same way that a database might now be used.

“A collection without order, drawn from many papers, which I have copied here, hoping to arrange them later each in its place, according to the subjects of which they treat.”

Published Commonplace Books

The practise of keeping a Common Place book was particularly attractive to authors. Many, such as, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Mark Twain, and Virginia Woolf kept messy reading notes that were intermixed.

Both Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau were taught to keep commonplace books at Harvard University (their commonplace books were published later).

Over time, commonplace books of many eminent people got published. Wikipedia has a long list, here are some examples:

• Lovecraft, H.P. (4 July 2011). “Commonplace Book”.
• E.M. Forster, Commonplace Book, ed. Philip Gardner (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1985).
• Francis Bacon, The Promus of Formularies and Elegancies, Longman, Greens and Company, London, 1883. Bacon’s Promus was a rough list of elegant and useful phrases gleaned from reading and conversations that Bacon used as a sourcebook in writing and probably also as a promptbook for oral practice in public speaking.
• John Milton, Milton’s Commonplace Book, in John Milton: Complete Prose Works, gen. ed. Don M. Wolfe (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1953). Milton kept scholarly notes from his reading, complete with page citations to use in writing his tracts and poems.
• Mrs. Anna Anderson, A Common Place Book of Thoughts, Memories and Fancies (Longman, Brown, Green and Longman, 1855)
• Robert Burns, Robert Burns’s Commonplace Book. 1783–1785. James Cameron Ewing and Davidson Cook. Glasgow : Gowans and Gray Ltd., 1938.

Ronald Reagan, also kept a commonplace book with traditional commonplace headings and used index cards which he kept in the plastic sleeves of a black photo album. His notes were published as the book The Notes: Ronald Reagan’s Private Collection of Stories and Wisdom (Harper Collins, 2011).

W. Ross Ashby, a psychiatrist and a pioneer in cybernetics, started a commonplace book in May 1928 as a medical student. He kept it for 44 years until his death. At which point it occupied 25 volumes comprising 7,189 pages. It was indexed with 1,600 index cards.

The British Library created a digital archive of his commonplace book which has been published online with extensive cross-linking based on his original index. http://www.rossashby.info/index.html.

Of the modern writers, Austin Kleon kept his commonplace book online. His whole blog is his commonplace book.

My Humble Commonplace book

I too have been keeping a commonplace book for a few years now and they are increasing in volumes.

I collect excerpts from books, newspapers, magazines and online reading. It has cuttings, sketches, mandalas and even some watercolour paintings.

Recently, I was going through my commonplace books when I realised there was far too much good stuff for them to just lie in the bottom drawer of my desk.

Image by the author.

That is when the idea of compiling them in a book started germinating in my head.

Having them in book form will mean that the material will be easily accessible.

Another benefit I can see is that in order to arrange them in a book will mean I will go through them and read them once again. Which will be a joy in itself.

With self-publishing so easy, it is a project I am considering spending some time on.

I am interested to know your thoughts.

Do you have a commonplace book?

Do you take it out and read it occasionally?

Would you consider publishing it?