- A new version of the Atlas of Early Printing was released this week, and is well worth spending some time with. Quite a useful resource and teaching tool.
- Writing in Latham's Quarterly, Paul Collins explores, well, "Monkey Business."
- From Echoes from the Vault, a few fakes and forgeries from the special collections at the University of St. Andrews.
- The Yale Law Library Rare Books Blog celebrated its fifth birthday this week. Many congratulations to all involved, particularly Mike Widener, and here's to many more years!
- Another of my favorite blogs also had a birthday this week: Caleb Crain marked the tenth anniversary of Steamboats are Ruining Everything by relaunching with a fresh new look: well done!
- Reported stolen from Peter Harrington, The Federalist in original boards. See the full description.
- Travis McDade writes on the OUP Blog about the professionalization of book theft rings, noting that the involvement of someone specifically to remove library markings is usually a good indicator that a theft scheme has "gone pro".
- Over at the Royal Society's The Repository blog, Felicity Harrington muses on reading Hooke's Micrographia, then and now.
- A "former bookstore owner" from Cambridge, MA (whose identity I imagine will be easily determined by many readers of this blog) has reported that someone's been breaking into her house and stealing poetry books.
- In a delightful essay at the Public Domain Review, Patricia Fara explores the iconography of Joseph Banks. And by the way, the PDR is raising funds to keep their project going, and if you can give, I encourage you to do so (I have).
- As the Digital Public Library of America prepares for its launch event on 18-19 April at the Boston Public Library, Robert Darnton provides some background and future plans for the project in an NYRB essay. A good overview look at the project, as is Tim Carmody's Verge piece on the DPLA.
- Mills Kelly's "Lying About the Past" course has been deep-sixed. Mill posted about this on his blog this week, and Dan Berrett at The Chronicle followed up.
- From the American Birding Association blog, a report that a pair of ornithologists are attempting to use descriptions and drawings by William Bartram and other 18th-century birders to identify a previously-discounted species, the painted vulture.
Reviews
- Monte Reel's Between Man and Beast; review by David Quammen in the NYTimes.
- Mary Roach's Gulp; review by Janet Maslin in the NYTimes.
- Joyce Carol Oates' The Accursed; review by Wendy Smith in the LATimes.
