Sunday, October 26, 2014

Links & Reviews

- There's a new Harvard Library policy governing access to digital reproductions of public domain works, and it's a good 'un. In part: "Harvard Library asserts no copyright over digital reproductions of works in its collections which are in the public domain, where those digital reproductions are made openly available on Harvard Library websites."

- Terry Belanger is doing the book world a great service by posting a series of dispatches from last week's National Colloquium on Library Special Collections ("Acknowledging the Past, Forging the Future") on ExLibris. See Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V (so far; more to come).

- ILAB has released a list of books believed stolen from the Cappuccini Library in Florence.

- The AAS has announced a conference and workshop, The Digital Antiquarian, to be held at the end of May and first week in June, 2015.

- The Thoreau Institute has purchased the Thoreau collection of bookseller Kevin Mac Donnell.

- Nate Pedersen talked to author Christine Jackson about her 2013 book John James LaForest Audubon: An English Perspective for the FB&C blog.

- A notebook from the 1910–1913 Scott expedition, containing notes by scientist George Murray Levick about photographs taken in 1911, was found last summer at the site of Scott's Terra Nova base camp.

- Over at I Love Typography, "The First Female Typographer."

- The New Haven Register profiles the team working on preserving and digitizing Yale's collection of papyri.

- The Soldiers National Museum in Gettysburg will close in November, and its collection of Civil War artifacts and other materials will be sold at auction.

- Eric Kwakkel has collected some excellent images of various ways parchment "goes bad," to complement equally excellent explanatory text.

- Brandon Butler writes about the new round of GSU copyright litigation in "Transformative Teaching after GSU."

- Ben Breen has a blog post at The Paris Review about his experience at RBS this summer.

- A deal was reached this week that will keep a Barnes & Noble open in the Bronx for at least the next two years.

- The Guardian highlights the new Cambridge University Library exhibition Private Lives of Print.

- Simon Beattie highlights a German pamphlet from 1930 advertising a "bibliotour" to the northeastern United States.

- Caroline Duroselle-Melish has been named the Andrew W. Mellow Curator of Early Modern Books and Prints at the Folger Shakespeare Library.

Sean Quimby has been appointed Director of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library (RBML) at Columbia University.

Reviews

- Jill Lepore's The Secret History of Wonder Woman; reviews by Etelka Lehoczky for NPR, Dwight Garner in the NYTimes, Carol Tavris in the WSJ, and Laura Hudson in the LATimes.

- Charlie Lovett's First Impressions; review by B.L. Clark at The Exile Bibliophile.

- Lucy Worsley's The Art of the English Murder; review by Sara Paretsky in the NYTimes.

- Laura Auricchio's The Marquis: Lafayette Reconsidered; review by Jonathan Yardley in the WaPo.

- Roger Clarke's Ghosts: A Natural History; review by Patrick McGrath in the NYTimes.

- Peter Wright's The Copyright Wars; review by Louis Menand in The New Yorker.

- Mark Hallett's Reynolds: Portraiture in Action; review by Norma Clarke in the TLS.

- Andrew McConnell Stott's The Poet and the Vampyre; review by Maxwell Carter in the NYTimes.

Sunday, October 19, 2014

Links & Reviews

- Erik Kwakkel and Giulio Menna have launched a new website, Quill: Books Before Print.

- Philip Palmer writes on the Clark Library blog (The Clog) about manuscript captions added to early woodcuts and engravings.

- The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has partially reversed the GSU e-reserves decision handed down in May 2012. Jen Howard has a thorough report in the Chronicle. The appeals court found that the lower court judge had incorrectly weighed the four factors used to gauge fair use and returned the case for further examination. More on this decision from Kevin Smith.

- The Friends of Bangor Public Library have recognized collectibles dealer Paul Zebiak for his role in returning stolen posters and photographs to the library. Insider thief Russell Graves is serving a six-month jail sentence for the thefts.

- A new open-access journal of special collections, The Reading Room, launched this week.

- There's a report in the NYTimes about 14th-century birch-bark documents found in mud near Novgorod. More than a thousand such documents have been uncovered so far.

- A 31-year-old Bethesda, MD woman, Christina Wimmel, pleaded guilty to the theft of rare books worth more than $30,000 from her neighbor, collector-dealer Julia Jordan. Wimmel was sentenced to probation and the payment of restitution.

- The shortlist for this year's National Book Awards were announced this week.

- Curators at the Huntington Library have found amongst their uncataloged books two sections of the Yongle Encyclopedia (~1562), called the largest book ever printed in China.

- Toni Morrison's papers have been acquired by Princeton University.

- Jeff Peachey writes about the new Mark Landis documentary "Art and Craft" from a conservators' perspective.

- In Lapham's Quarterly, Colin Dickey reconsiders Virginia Woolf's novel Orlando.

- For Ada Lovelace Day this week, Sarah Werner highlighted an exercise she's used with her students to find early women printers in the book trade records. Joe Adelman posed a question about the integration of women printers into the history of early American printing at The Junto.

- The University of South Carolina has acquired the literary archive of Elmore Leonard.

- In the NYRB, Robert A. Schneider, editor of the AHR, replies to Robert Darnton's most recent NYRB essay, and Darnton responds: Overpriced Scholarship: An Exchange.

- Sam Roberts profiles Richard Norton Smith about Smith's new biography of Nelson Rockefeller.

- McSweeney's founder Dave Eggers announced this week that he is transitioning McSweeney's into a non-profit organization.

Reviews

- Steven Pinker's The Sense of Style; review by Charles McGrath in the NYTimes.

- Cary Elwes' As You Wish; review by Alexandra Mullen in the WSJ.

- Jonathan Darman's Landslide; review by Sean Wilentz in the NYTimes.

- A trio of new books on reading in the digital age; review by Jennifer Howard in the TLS.

- Zephyr Teachout's Corruption in America; review by Thomas Frank in the NYTimes.

- Richard Norton Smith's On His Own Terms; review by Robert K. Landers in the WSJ.

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Links & Reviews

- Emory University has acquired an important archive of Flanner O'Connor materials.

- A number of early Buddhist manuscripts, some dating to the sixth century, have reportedly been destroyed in floods in India.

- Sarah Werner writes on the Collation blog about the question of capturing bookseller and librarian notes in catalog records. And Erin Blake notes a new Hamnet URL and some nifty new search filters.

- The Bodleian Library has been successful in its bid to purchase the William Henry Fox Talbot archive of early photographs, as well as the photographer's diaries and letters. A 2017 exhibition is planned.

- The JHU student paper covers the exhibition of the Arthur and Janet Freeman Bibliotheca Fictiva Collection at Peabody Library (through February).

- D.H. Lawrence's manuscript of his short story "Her Turn" has been acquired by Harvard's Houghton Library.

- Manuscript Road Trip visits Virginia this week, and features a few of RBS's teaching manuscripts.

- Speaking of RBS, most scholarship applications are due this week, so don't forget to submit your applications!

- Eric Kwakkel explores the imagery of medieval desktops and highlights book clasps. He's also interviewed for an Independent article about early manuscript doodles.

- Yale conservators are working on the 7,000-item papryus collection, preparing the material for long-term access and use.

- Bob McCamant reported on this year's Oak Knoll Fest for the Fine Press Book Association blog: Day 1, Days 2/3.

- A copy of a 1916 silent film starring William Gillette as Sherlock Holmes has been found in a French film archive.

- A new database of British slave ownership is now available from UCL.

- The Economist has a long article on the future of the book, "From Papyrus to Pixels." Choose the magazine ("scroll") format for minimal obnoxiousness.

- Graham Bowley reports for the NYTimes on antiquities being damaged and/or lost in Iraq and Syria.

- The Paul Revere House has acquired a 1775 letter from Paul to Rachel Revere, previously conserved at NEDCC.

- Katherine Seelye reports for the NYTimes on the new Poe statue in Boston.

- Nine newly-digitized Civil War manuscript collections are now available from the Massachusetts Historical Society.

- Sara Georgini writes for The Junto on some early American diplomatic ciphers.

Reviews

- Edward Baptist's The Half Has Never Been Told; reviews by Eric Foner and Felicia R. Lee in the NYTimes. 

- E.O. Wilson's The Meaning of Human Existence; review by Dwight Garner in the NYTimes.

- Peter Baldwin's The Copyright Wars; review at LISNews.

- Laura Auricchio's The Marquis; review by Frederick Brown in the WSJ.

- Stephen Pinker's The Sense of Style; review by Jacob Silverman in the CSM.

- Robin Varnum's Álvar Núnez Cabeza de Vaca: American Trailblazer; review by Marie Arana in the WaPo.

- James McPherson's Embattled Rebel; review by Ryan Cole in the WSJ.

- Italo Calvino's The Complete Cosmicomics; review by Michael Dirda in the WaPo.

- Colm Toíbín's Nora Webster; review by Darin Strauss in the LATimes.

Thursday, October 02, 2014

Links & Reviews

- The DPLA has received a $999,485 grant from the IMLS to fund an expansion of the DPLA's service hubs network.

- Mozart's manuscript score of his Piano Sonata in A has been found at the National Szechenyi Library in Budapest.

- Martha Carlin writes in the TLS about a ~1643 manuscript description of Southwark which mentions Shakespeare and his contemporaries having carved their names into the panelled walls of the Tabard Inn.

- The Telegraph reports on the restoration of Mrs. Gaskell's house and gardens.

- Over at Aeon, David Armitage and Jo Guldi ask "how did history abdicate its role of inspiring the longer view?"

- A new exhibition has launched at Harvard's Houghton Library, "InsideOUT: Contemporary Bindings of Private Press Books."

- From Amanda French, "On some books in Edna St. Vincent Millay's library."

- Historian James McPherson talks books for the NYT's "By the Books" feature.

- The winners of the 2014 National Collegiate Book-Collecting Contest have been announced.

- An IMLS grant will fund the digitization of nearly 200 rare volumes from the Clark Art Institute's Julius S. Held Collection of Rare Books.

- Steve Moyer has a piece in the current issue of Humanities about artist John Gould and Ralph Nicholson Ellis, Jr., whose efforts to collect Gould's works nearly bankrupted him.

- The Boston Globe highlights the coming installation of a Poe statue in Boston, and BU professor Paul Lewis' long push to get the city to recognize Poe as a native son.

- Speaking of Poe, Susan Jaffe Tane spoke to FB&C about her collection of Poe, some of which is currently on display at the Grolier Club.

- A collection of Ray Bradbury's books, art, ephemera, &c. made $493,408 at auction last week.

- Arion Press, for their one-hundredth publication, will produce a new fine-press edition of Whitman's Leaves of Grass.

- News in June, but new to me: Bowdoin College has acquired a 328-volume collection of Sarah Wyman Whitman bindings, donated by collector Jean Paul Michaud.

- The NYT Arts Beat blog reported that some reviewers received copies of an ARC of Anthony Horowitz's new book Moriarty containing authorial back-and-forth with copy editors.

- The Royal College of Physicians will host a 2016 exhibition titled "Scholar, courtier, magician: the lost library of John Dee."

- Hannah Bailey guest-posts at The Junto about the importance of French archives for early American historians.

- Three 17th-century Japanese scrolls are now available digitally through the Princeton University Digital Library.

- First Folio thief Raymond Scott is back in the news after the prison where he committed suicide has come under scrutiny for not providing better mental health care. More coverage from the BBC and ChronicleLive.

- Also at The Junto, Sara Georgini provides an inside look at the process that goes into creating the Adams Papers editorial project volumes.

- From Jim Ambuske at the Scholars' Lab blog, "Visualizing Early America through MapScholar and Beyond."

- Author James Patterson plans to donate £130,000 to more than 70 independent bookshops across the UK. The funds will be used to promote programs designed to "inspire children to become lifelong readers."

- From Rare Books Digest, "Rare, Signed and Forged," in which the author lays out some suggested criteria for buying (or selling) signed books.

Reviews

- Michael Farquhar's Secret Lives of the Tsars; review by Hank Cox in the WaPo.

- Ellen T. Harris' George Friedrich Handel: A Life with Friends; review by Weston Williams in the CSM.

- S.C. Gwynne's Rebel Yell; review by Allen Guelzo in the WSJ.

- Robert Darnton's Censors at Work; review by Felipe Fernández-Armesto in the WSJ.

Book Review: "The Forgers"

Bradford Morrow's The Forgers (forthcoming from Mysterious Press) was a must-read for me, given my particular interests in both bibliomysteries and literary forgery. Plus, it got blurbed by both Joyce Carol Oates and Nick Basbanes, and that can't possibly be a very common combination.

Morrow's time as a book dealer and collector serves him well here; it always helps, when writing about the rare book trade, to know what you're talking about, and by and large Morrow ably captures the atmospherics of the trade ... including some of its darker aspects.

"They never found his hands." With that first line Morrow draws the reader into a tale of brutal murder, blackmail, forgery, and psychological terror, about which I'll spoil no more than that. This suspenseful tale, told by the classic unreliable narrator, makes for a thoroughly enjoyable and pleasantly creepy read.

It's not a perfect book: some early foreshadowing sort of gives the game away, a few of the characters don't feel quite fleshed out, and there are a few slow spots pacing-wise. But no matter - it's quite a good book and I'll recommend it without reservation.