Another bookmobile. Wow. This thing is beautiful. I’m home sick today, listening to football via the net. This link has been occupying some of my time today as well: http://etsybooks.blogspot.com/2008/07/best-tutorials.htm. From the Bookbinding Etsy Street Team, a collection of bookbinding related tutorials. Great stuff… like this bookmobile. *Sigh*
Bookbinding Tool Mystery?
I bought this for $5 a while ago. I have no idea what it is. The seller proudly proclaimed it was a very antique bookbinding tool. No, he didn’t know I have an interest in bookbinding, so I wasn’t baited. Too badly. Anyway, does have a bit of age on it, wood turned screws, etc. It is not very big, and hinged at the back. I think it’s the back. It has been used a lot, the screws have worn corresponding holes in the board they push against. Of course, there are no markings. The only thing I can think of is it is used to trim small text blocks. One photo has a standard sized Zebra ink pen for scale. Anyone?
Tour de livres Prague
Tour de livres Prague
Leopard Bikini Found in Book
Had another book safari for the ages. I found some great books for myself, but also found an instruction book on Hawking! I’m not interested in hawking, personally, at least beyond the theoretical. Don’t get me wrong, training raptors to hunt for you is cool, but I already have too many hobbies. But what a fun book to sit with and learn a little from!
And also, if you’re like me, there is never quite enough money for the books I want, so when I find other interesting books I know are collectible in their own right, I pick them up and send them along to more appreciative owners. Like hawk trainers. For money.
Flipping through the book once I was home, I found a great flyaway. Flyaways are the little bits of stuff we leave in our books to be found later. Receipts, movie tickets, torn off bits are the norm, but I once found a chocolate chip and 30+-year-old pornography carefully Exacto knifed and taped into a compact accordion of pocket smut. Not in the same book, though. Some old-time booksellers refer to flyaways as “hay” though more and more collectors, booksellers, and antique dealers now refer to it as ephemera.
I know you doubt it, but the post card is actually hawking related. The Rare Bird Farm in Miami Florida sent a message to the effect “No, we don’t have hawks”. Photo by Bunny Yeager. Now to decide if I should sell the postcard separate on ebay, or just leave it in the book where I found it for the next guy.
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Prodigious Redux
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Curator of Rare Books Stephen Ferguson shared a wonderful quote prompted by the earlier posting:
“The open mouth, and raised arms with open hands turned outwards, is an expression of astonishment very general all over the world. Mr. Darwin explains the open mouth by a complication of causes, but he omits to notice, what seems to me a very probable one, that it represents an incipient cry of alarm or fear, or call for help. The raising of the arms and the open hands are explained by antithesis, they being the opposite of a state of indifference or listlessness.”
This quote is from a review of Darwin’s The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals, 1879.
Be sure to pop over to Stephen’s Blog from the Princeton University Library Rare Books and Special Collections. Thanks Stephen!
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