- In Science, "Goats, bookworms, a monk's kiss: Biologists reveal the hidden history of ancient gospels."
- Alison Flood and Sian Cain report on "the strange world of book thefts" for the Guardian.
- Julie Miller posts for the LOC blog about a recent acquisition: the 1783 petition from loyalist Isaac Low to the Loyalist Claims Commission.
- Over at JHIBlog, Spencer Weinreich on the "forgotten partnership" between Houdini and Lovecraft.
- "A Possible Keats" from Fleur Jaeggy in the TLS.
- Phyllis Richardson writes for the Guardian on the "real buildings behind fictional houses."
- Liz Adams notes a neat provenance example from the Lisa Unger Baskin Collection at Duke.
- Some finds from the backlog are highlighted over at Echoes from the Vault.
- Historian Thomas Fleming died this week at the age of 90. NYTimes obituary.
- Over at Motherboard, "Why is the Internet Archive Painstakingly Preserving One Man's Junk Mail?"
- Lynne Thomas has been appointed head of the University of Illinois Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Reviews
- David Waldstreicher's new Library of America edition of the diaries of John Quincy Adams; review by Richard Brookhiser in the WSJ.
- Peter Parker's Housman Country; review by Alan Riding in the NYTimes.
- David Williams' When the English Fall; review by Swapna Krishna in the LATimes.
Looks like a quiet auction week.
Sunday, July 30, 2017
Sunday, July 23, 2017
Links & Reviews
- Theft alert: four signed books were stolen from Bloomington, IN.
- The AHA posted a quick update on congressional budget actions taken last week regarding cultural heritage programs. It's good news so far, but we must keep the pressure on.
- Preview tickets for this year's Brooklyn Antiquarian Book Fair (8–10 September) are now available; this year proceeds from the preview will benefit the Rare Book School Scholarship fund.
- The Princeton Graphic Arts Collection blog highlights a new edition of Swift's A Modest Proposal.
- From the same blog, a short piece about William Earl Dodge and the preservation of some of Audubon's bird plates.
- Susan Falciani profiles book thief James Richard Shinn for Atlas Obscura.
- A new "fused imaging" technique developed at Northwestern University may be useful for reading fragments hidden inside bookbindings.
- Over at Lux Mentis, Booksellers, Ian Kahn posts about an absolutely awesome new acquisition: a record player, albums, and technical specs from the Library of Congress' Talking Books project. He's shared lots of pictures too - have a look!
- Erin Blake writes about her time at Rare Book School at The Collation: "I learned to read Secretary Hand!!!! (And so can you)"
- Janice Hansen writes for the Chapel Hill Rare Book Blog about a recent find in the stacks.
- Duke has acquired a volume from Thomas Jefferson's library that also happened to be owned later by William Howard Taft.
- Ian Sansom rereads Jane Austen for the TLS.
Reviews
- Robert Thake's A Publishing History of a Prohibited Best-Seller; review by David Coward in the TLS.
- Francis Spufford's Golden Hill; review by Karen Heller in the WaPo.
- Adam Begley's The Great Nadar; review by Michael Dirda in the WaPo.
Upcoming Auctions
- Fine Literature & Fine Books at PBA Galleries on 27 July.
- Rare Books and Works on Paper at Bloomsbury on 27 July.
- The AHA posted a quick update on congressional budget actions taken last week regarding cultural heritage programs. It's good news so far, but we must keep the pressure on.
- Preview tickets for this year's Brooklyn Antiquarian Book Fair (8–10 September) are now available; this year proceeds from the preview will benefit the Rare Book School Scholarship fund.
- The Princeton Graphic Arts Collection blog highlights a new edition of Swift's A Modest Proposal.
- From the same blog, a short piece about William Earl Dodge and the preservation of some of Audubon's bird plates.
- Susan Falciani profiles book thief James Richard Shinn for Atlas Obscura.
- A new "fused imaging" technique developed at Northwestern University may be useful for reading fragments hidden inside bookbindings.
- Over at Lux Mentis, Booksellers, Ian Kahn posts about an absolutely awesome new acquisition: a record player, albums, and technical specs from the Library of Congress' Talking Books project. He's shared lots of pictures too - have a look!
- Erin Blake writes about her time at Rare Book School at The Collation: "I learned to read Secretary Hand!!!! (And so can you)"
- Janice Hansen writes for the Chapel Hill Rare Book Blog about a recent find in the stacks.
- Duke has acquired a volume from Thomas Jefferson's library that also happened to be owned later by William Howard Taft.
- Ian Sansom rereads Jane Austen for the TLS.
Reviews
- Robert Thake's A Publishing History of a Prohibited Best-Seller; review by David Coward in the TLS.
- Francis Spufford's Golden Hill; review by Karen Heller in the WaPo.
- Adam Begley's The Great Nadar; review by Michael Dirda in the WaPo.
Upcoming Auctions
- Fine Literature & Fine Books at PBA Galleries on 27 July.
- Rare Books and Works on Paper at Bloomsbury on 27 July.
Sunday, July 16, 2017
Links & Reviews
- A very happy anniversary to Tavistock Books, celebrating twenty years on Saturday! They've posted a Q&A with Vic Zoschak to mark the occasion.
- From Scientific American, "Peering beneath the Surface of Ancient Manuscripts."
- A €10 million redevelopment plan has been announced by the National Library of Ireland.
- Roger Gaskell and Erin Schreiner write about the new replica 18th-century rolling press at Rare Book School at JHIBlog.
- From Aaron Pratt at Cultural Compass (the HRC blog), "Instructions for reading aloud in the Gutenberg Bible."
- The Watkinson Library at Trinity College has acquired the personal library of Trinity alumnus Charles Hayden Proctor, kept intact since Proctor's death in 1890.
- Nate Pedersen talks to Edwin D. Rose for the FB&C "Bright Young Collectors" series.
- ABAA posted an alert about a missing book in San Francisco.
- Willamette Week highlights The Brautigan Library.
- The MHS has acquired Col. Robert Gould Shaw's Civil War sword, which recently turned up in a Shaw family home.
- At the Peter Harrington blog, "The Book Huntresses: Women Bibliophiles."
- Katy Lasdow talks to Alea Henle for the Junto's "Where Historians Work" series.
- There's a fascinating update on the Discovering Lost Manuscripts Project at the University of St. Andrews.
- A new exhibition at Marsh's Library highlights the stories of books stolen from the library since its founding.
- Biblio and Rare Book Hub are partnering to allow Hub subscribers to sell directly through the site using Biblio's search and e-commerce systems.
- Sarah Hovde posts at The Collation about some tricky Shakespearean "novelettes."
- Book collector Sir Sydney Carlyle Cockerell is featured as the ONDB "Life of the Week."
- Over at Steamboats Are Ruining Everything, Caleb Crain offers "A Longitudinal study of self-presentation on the interwebs."
- Biographer Kenneth Silverman died this week; see the NYTimes obituary.
- The ABAA blog reposts Richard Norman's "History of Vellum and Parchment."
- Book collector John Mellman has posted a "History and Personal Assessment" of the Harper Torchbooks series at Publishing History.
- I've begun playing around with Tropy, a new software program for research photo management from CHNM. Still in beta, but it looks really promising so far! [h/t Mitch Fraas]
Book Reviews
- The Card Catalog; review by Michael Lindgren in the WaPo.
- Lucy Worsley's Jane Austen at Home; review by Amy Bloom in the NYTimes.
- Helen Kelly's Jane Austen: The Secret Radical; review by John Sutherland in the NYTimes.
- Fred Kaplan's Lincoln and the Abolitionists; review by Manisha Sinha in the WaPo.
Upcoming Auctions
- Printed Books, Maps & Documents at Dominic Winter Auctioneers on 19 July.
- Children's & Illustrated Books at Dominic Winter Auctioneers on 20 July.
- Space Exploration at Sotheby's New York on 20 July.
- From Scientific American, "Peering beneath the Surface of Ancient Manuscripts."
- A €10 million redevelopment plan has been announced by the National Library of Ireland.
- Roger Gaskell and Erin Schreiner write about the new replica 18th-century rolling press at Rare Book School at JHIBlog.
- From Aaron Pratt at Cultural Compass (the HRC blog), "Instructions for reading aloud in the Gutenberg Bible."
- The Watkinson Library at Trinity College has acquired the personal library of Trinity alumnus Charles Hayden Proctor, kept intact since Proctor's death in 1890.
- Nate Pedersen talks to Edwin D. Rose for the FB&C "Bright Young Collectors" series.
- ABAA posted an alert about a missing book in San Francisco.
- Willamette Week highlights The Brautigan Library.
- The MHS has acquired Col. Robert Gould Shaw's Civil War sword, which recently turned up in a Shaw family home.
- At the Peter Harrington blog, "The Book Huntresses: Women Bibliophiles."
- Katy Lasdow talks to Alea Henle for the Junto's "Where Historians Work" series.
- There's a fascinating update on the Discovering Lost Manuscripts Project at the University of St. Andrews.
- A new exhibition at Marsh's Library highlights the stories of books stolen from the library since its founding.
- Biblio and Rare Book Hub are partnering to allow Hub subscribers to sell directly through the site using Biblio's search and e-commerce systems.
- Sarah Hovde posts at The Collation about some tricky Shakespearean "novelettes."
- Book collector Sir Sydney Carlyle Cockerell is featured as the ONDB "Life of the Week."
- Over at Steamboats Are Ruining Everything, Caleb Crain offers "A Longitudinal study of self-presentation on the interwebs."
- Biographer Kenneth Silverman died this week; see the NYTimes obituary.
- The ABAA blog reposts Richard Norman's "History of Vellum and Parchment."
- Book collector John Mellman has posted a "History and Personal Assessment" of the Harper Torchbooks series at Publishing History.
- I've begun playing around with Tropy, a new software program for research photo management from CHNM. Still in beta, but it looks really promising so far! [h/t Mitch Fraas]
Book Reviews
- The Card Catalog; review by Michael Lindgren in the WaPo.
- Lucy Worsley's Jane Austen at Home; review by Amy Bloom in the NYTimes.
- Helen Kelly's Jane Austen: The Secret Radical; review by John Sutherland in the NYTimes.
- Fred Kaplan's Lincoln and the Abolitionists; review by Manisha Sinha in the WaPo.
Upcoming Auctions
- Printed Books, Maps & Documents at Dominic Winter Auctioneers on 19 July.
- Children's & Illustrated Books at Dominic Winter Auctioneers on 20 July.
- Space Exploration at Sotheby's New York on 20 July.
Sunday, July 09, 2017
Links & Reviews
- From Vayos Liapis at the OUP blog: "The real thing: the thrills of inauthentic literature."
- Erin Blake writes for The Collation about an ~1857 photographic facsimile, one of the first made of an entire book.
- A walking stick once owned by Sir Walter Scott will be on the auction block this week.
- The Godmersham Lost Sheep Society is on the hunt for books containing the bookplate(s) of Montagu George Knight.
- The first issue of Thresholds, a new "experiment in digital publishing," is out.
- A crowdfunding effort is underway to digitize and make available the slide collection of Christopher Clarkson.
- Danuta Kean reports for the Guardian on the latest Voynich Manuscript theory.
- Echoes from the Vault marked the 330th anniversary of the publication of Newton's Principia.
- The Library of Congress has posted video of an April talk by Wayne Wiegand, "How Long, O Lord, Do We Roam in the Wilderness? A History of School Librarianship."
- From FB&C, "The Lost Libraries of London," by A. N. Devers.
- An 1812 Jane Austen letter parodying a recent novel will be sold at auction this week.
- Mississippi State University has acquired a large collection related to Lincoln and the Civil War.
- The JTA highlights Amsterdam's Livraria Ets Haim, described as "the world's oldest functioning Jewish library."
- Some recent finds from a study of Cornell's illuminated manuscripts using XRF technology are featured in the Cornell Chronicle.
- New from the Massachusetts Historical Society, and freely available as an e-book, "The Future of History."
- Also from MHS, a new fundraising campaign to support transcription and digitization of John Quincy Adams' diaries.
- From the NYTimes Upshot blog, "The Word Choices That Explain Why Jane Austen Endures."
- Over on the Scholars' Lab blog, James Ascher posts on "Transcribing Typography with Markdown."
- Forgot this last week: a photo claimed to be of Jesse James has surfaced, and will be sold at auction on August.
Reviews
- William Hogeland's Autumn of the Black Snake; review by Tom Cutterham at The Junto.
- Rebecca Brannon's From Revolution to Revolution; review by Christopher Minty at The Junto.
- Abigail Williams' The Social Life of Books; review by Ernest Hilbert in the WaPo.
Upcoming Auctions
- English Literature, History, Children's Books and Illustrations, including The Garrett Herman Collection: The Age of Darwin at Sotheby's London on 11 July.
- Valuable Books and Manuscripts at Christie's London on 12 July.
- Art & Illustration - Fine Children's Literature at PBA Galleries on 13 July.
- Erin Blake writes for The Collation about an ~1857 photographic facsimile, one of the first made of an entire book.
- A walking stick once owned by Sir Walter Scott will be on the auction block this week.
- The Godmersham Lost Sheep Society is on the hunt for books containing the bookplate(s) of Montagu George Knight.
- The first issue of Thresholds, a new "experiment in digital publishing," is out.
- A crowdfunding effort is underway to digitize and make available the slide collection of Christopher Clarkson.
- Danuta Kean reports for the Guardian on the latest Voynich Manuscript theory.
- Echoes from the Vault marked the 330th anniversary of the publication of Newton's Principia.
- The Library of Congress has posted video of an April talk by Wayne Wiegand, "How Long, O Lord, Do We Roam in the Wilderness? A History of School Librarianship."
- From FB&C, "The Lost Libraries of London," by A. N. Devers.
- An 1812 Jane Austen letter parodying a recent novel will be sold at auction this week.
- Mississippi State University has acquired a large collection related to Lincoln and the Civil War.
- The JTA highlights Amsterdam's Livraria Ets Haim, described as "the world's oldest functioning Jewish library."
- Some recent finds from a study of Cornell's illuminated manuscripts using XRF technology are featured in the Cornell Chronicle.
- New from the Massachusetts Historical Society, and freely available as an e-book, "The Future of History."
- Also from MHS, a new fundraising campaign to support transcription and digitization of John Quincy Adams' diaries.
- From the NYTimes Upshot blog, "The Word Choices That Explain Why Jane Austen Endures."
- Over on the Scholars' Lab blog, James Ascher posts on "Transcribing Typography with Markdown."
- Forgot this last week: a photo claimed to be of Jesse James has surfaced, and will be sold at auction on August.
Reviews
- William Hogeland's Autumn of the Black Snake; review by Tom Cutterham at The Junto.
- Rebecca Brannon's From Revolution to Revolution; review by Christopher Minty at The Junto.
- Abigail Williams' The Social Life of Books; review by Ernest Hilbert in the WaPo.
Upcoming Auctions
- English Literature, History, Children's Books and Illustrations, including The Garrett Herman Collection: The Age of Darwin at Sotheby's London on 11 July.
- Valuable Books and Manuscripts at Christie's London on 12 July.
- Art & Illustration - Fine Children's Literature at PBA Galleries on 13 July.
Sunday, July 02, 2017
Links & Reviews
- Catherine Allgor has been appointed the next president of the Massachusetts Historical Society.
- David Whitesell posts at Notes from Under Grounds about a major new acquisition.
- The Junto has a Q&A with David Gary of the American Philosophical Society as part of their "Where Historians Work" series.
- Tess Goodman writes for JHIBlog on "The Idea of the Souvenir: Mauchline Ware."
- Common-place has a new issue up, with thirteen emerging scholars introducing pre-1800 American texts.
- Also at JHIBlog, Yitzchak Schwartz has a review of this year's Manfred R. Lehman Workshop on the History of the Hebrew Book in "Towards a History of Hebrew Book Collecting."
- There's a great deal in the July Rare Book Monthly: Bruce McKinney on quite an interesting Revolutionary War collection, Thibaut Ehrengardt on an "untouched collection" in Belgium, and Eric Caren on the 15 June Christie's sale of important items from his collection.
- Over at Past is Present, "The Practice of Everyday Cataloging: 'Blacks as Authors' and the Early American Bibliographic Record."
- Mary Beard's "Learning to be a librarian" made me laugh out loud at least twice.
- Paul Grondahl reports on a recent eBay find of an Albany County judicial ledger; the story has a connection to the Daniel Lorello archives thefts from several years ago.
- The Sion College Library Provenance Project has been relaunched.
- APHA is now "accepting short articles on lesser known aspects of the history of printing and related arts and crafts, including calligraphy, typefounding, typography, papermaking, bookbinding, illustration, and publishing" for publication on the APHA website.
Reviews
- Charlie English's The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu; review by William Dalrymple in the Guardian.
- Sarah Williams' Damnable Practises; review by Penelope Gouk at H-Net Reviews.
- Ronald White's American Ulysses; review by Chris Fobare at H-Net Reviews.
Upcoming Auctions
- Western & Oriental Manuscripts and Miniatures at Drewatts & Bloomsbury on 6 July.
- Fine Books & Manuscripts at Potter & Potter on 8 July.
- David Whitesell posts at Notes from Under Grounds about a major new acquisition.
- The Junto has a Q&A with David Gary of the American Philosophical Society as part of their "Where Historians Work" series.
- Tess Goodman writes for JHIBlog on "The Idea of the Souvenir: Mauchline Ware."
- Common-place has a new issue up, with thirteen emerging scholars introducing pre-1800 American texts.
- Also at JHIBlog, Yitzchak Schwartz has a review of this year's Manfred R. Lehman Workshop on the History of the Hebrew Book in "Towards a History of Hebrew Book Collecting."
- There's a great deal in the July Rare Book Monthly: Bruce McKinney on quite an interesting Revolutionary War collection, Thibaut Ehrengardt on an "untouched collection" in Belgium, and Eric Caren on the 15 June Christie's sale of important items from his collection.
- Over at Past is Present, "The Practice of Everyday Cataloging: 'Blacks as Authors' and the Early American Bibliographic Record."
- Mary Beard's "Learning to be a librarian" made me laugh out loud at least twice.
- Paul Grondahl reports on a recent eBay find of an Albany County judicial ledger; the story has a connection to the Daniel Lorello archives thefts from several years ago.
- The Sion College Library Provenance Project has been relaunched.
- APHA is now "accepting short articles on lesser known aspects of the history of printing and related arts and crafts, including calligraphy, typefounding, typography, papermaking, bookbinding, illustration, and publishing" for publication on the APHA website.
Reviews
- Charlie English's The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu; review by William Dalrymple in the Guardian.
- Sarah Williams' Damnable Practises; review by Penelope Gouk at H-Net Reviews.
- Ronald White's American Ulysses; review by Chris Fobare at H-Net Reviews.
Upcoming Auctions
- Western & Oriental Manuscripts and Miniatures at Drewatts & Bloomsbury on 6 July.
- Fine Books & Manuscripts at Potter & Potter on 8 July.
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