The English Short-Title Catalogue, a fantastic database listing over 460,000 items published (mainly in English) between 1473 and 1800, is now available online (for free) from the British Library at http://estc.bl.uk.
In a press release, the BL notes "The ESTC is unparalleled in its depth and range containing all types of printed material including letterpress books, pamphlets, newspapers, serials, advertisements, slip-songs, election handbills and a variety of other ephemera. The coverage extends to items printed in all languages in the British Isles and beyond, to Colonial America, United States of America (1776-1800), Canada, or territories governed by Britain before 1801. It covers Portuguese printing from India, German printing from North America, Gaelic printing from Scotland, and French printing from both France and the Netherlands. It also includes false ‘Londres' imprints, for material printed surreptitiously in France and the Netherlands. Engraved music, maps and prints are excluded from the catalogue but atlases and texts which are wholly engraved are in the ESTC."
This is a wonderful resource, and I'm delighted to see it so readily available.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
For Your Halloween Pleasure
- I cannot help but mention today the "War of the Worlds" broadcast which spooked the nation on October 30, 1938 (should have posted it yesterday but for some reason I always thought it happened on Halloween). The Mercury Theatre has audio of the broadcast (RealAudio or MP3) and they've also got a list of their (many) other radio plays, some which look quite interesting! It's always interesting to listen to the "War of the Worlds" broadcast, and if I get some time today I'm hoping to sit back and enjoy it again myself.
- Google's posted full digitized versions of some favorite "Scary Stories" for the occasion: I recommend "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," "The Tell-Tale Heart" and of course "Dracula."
- Via Fine Books Blog, AbeBooks has a highlighted interview today with dealer Larry Coven, who specializes in horror fiction. And speaking of horror, Abe has also tabulated the "10 Most Expensive Stephen King Books" they've sold through their site (linked from Rare Book News).
Happy Halloween!
- Google's posted full digitized versions of some favorite "Scary Stories" for the occasion: I recommend "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," "The Tell-Tale Heart" and of course "Dracula."
- Via Fine Books Blog, AbeBooks has a highlighted interview today with dealer Larry Coven, who specializes in horror fiction. And speaking of horror, Abe has also tabulated the "10 Most Expensive Stephen King Books" they've sold through their site (linked from Rare Book News).
Happy Halloween!
Monday, October 30, 2006
Excellent Roman Numeral Reference
After a query on Ex-Libris this morning about some unconventional Roman numeral usage, a member recommended this site, which I wanted to pass along for its extreme usefulness both in converting Roman numberals to Arabic and for recognizing alternative forms.
For Archives, Does Location Matter?
Brenda Maddox takes up this question in a column for The Guardian, spinning off a conference last week "on literary archives at the British Library, 'Manuscripts Matter', which brought together scholars, librarians, dealers, authors, even biographers like myself, all of whom, in their various ways, know the importance of the raw material - letters, rough drafts, even train tickets and bank statements - that show a writer's working life."
Some good debates here over security, cataloging speed, funding and archival integrity.
Some good debates here over security, cataloging speed, funding and archival integrity.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Some Sunday Reads
- Sunday Herald art critic Catriona Black (whose name would fit well as a character in Harry Potter) is in the Halloween spirit this weekend, delving into the spooky art of Scotland. "There is an undeniable taste in Scotland for the eerie, the gruesome, the dark side of life," she writes. "Convinced that a veritable coven of ghosts and ghouls lurks somewhere in the shadows of our public collections, I have embarked on a hunt to unearth artistic horrors too terrible to describe."
From fifteenth-century woodcuts of witches (including the first image of one riding a broom) in the National Library to Albrecht Dürer's eerie "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse", and on to eighteenth-century images of the witches from "Macbeth" as well as prints by "the most celebrated horror-monger of art history," Francisco Goya.
Quite a few neat little stories in this piece.
- Paul Collins at Weekend Stubble notes that he's on NPR's "Weekend Edition" (audio and some supplementals here) to talk about the sensational murder of Maria Marten by William Corder in 1827 and its aftermath. Collins has an article about the case in this month's "The Believer" which I have printed out to read today since it promises to be fascinating. If you think you've heard Corder's name in a rare-book context before, you probably have ... a copy of the famous book written about his case, The Mysterious Murder of Maria Marten (by James Curtis, 1828), was bound in Corder's own skin after his execution.
Collins does a great job of sussing out these stories from the nooks and crannies of history (his book Banvard's Folly is a must if you're interested in such things).
- The New York Times outlines a new controversy over what is claimed to be the first novel ever published by an African-American woman. The Curse of Caste; or the Slave Bride, by Julia Collins (serialized in 1865, but due to be published for the first time in book form this month by Oxford) is the first, say its editors; Harvard's Henry Louis Gates says the honor should go to Our Nig, published in 1859 by Harriet Wilson. The dispute, this report notes, "centers on competing definitions of what constitutes a novel."
Quite a few neat little stories in this piece.
- Paul Collins at Weekend Stubble notes that he's on NPR's "Weekend Edition" (audio and some supplementals here) to talk about the sensational murder of Maria Marten by William Corder in 1827 and its aftermath. Collins has an article about the case in this month's "The Believer" which I have printed out to read today since it promises to be fascinating. If you think you've heard Corder's name in a rare-book context before, you probably have ... a copy of the famous book written about his case, The Mysterious Murder of Maria Marten (by James Curtis, 1828), was bound in Corder's own skin after his execution.
Collins does a great job of sussing out these stories from the nooks and crannies of history (his book Banvard's Folly is a must if you're interested in such things).
- The New York Times outlines a new controversy over what is claimed to be the first novel ever published by an African-American woman. The Curse of Caste; or the Slave Bride, by Julia Collins (serialized in 1865, but due to be published for the first time in book form this month by Oxford) is the first, say its editors; Harvard's Henry Louis Gates says the honor should go to Our Nig, published in 1859 by Harriet Wilson. The dispute, this report notes, "centers on competing definitions of what constitutes a novel."
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Book Review: "Samuel Adams, Father of the American Revolution"
We are in sore need of a good modern biography of Sam Adams. Unfortunately, Mark Puls' new Samuel Adams: Father of the American Revolution (2006, Palgrave Macmillan) comes nowhere close to filling the bill.
While Puls' thesis (that Sam Adams played a vital role in bringing about the Revolution from a philosophical and public relations standpoint) is fundamentally sound and deserves a great deal of attention, his book contains multiple serious flaws which fatally undermine its entire structure.
Let me begin with what I view as one of the more substantial problems: sources. Puls' footnotes lead back, nearly all the time, to books which can hardly be described as at the forefront of modern historical scholarship. George Bancroft's History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent was published in 1882, while William Jackman's History of the American Nation came along in 1911. Both are cited repeatedly, as are Woodrow Wilson's History of the American People (1931) and the immediate post-Revolutionary histories of Mercy Otis Warren and William Gordon. All these are interesting in their own rights, it's true, but not exactly current. Puls' main sources for Adams' life appear to be the 1904 four-volume edition of his writings edited by Harry Alonzo Cushing and two earlier biographies (those of William Wells, published in 1865 and James Hosmer, which first appeared in 1884). Not once is a mention made of the Samuel Adams Papers which are mainly held by the New York Public Library. If Mr. Puls did any actual archival research at all, he certainly didn't make that fact particularly evident.
Of the 100 sources included in Puls' bibliography, exactly half were published prior to 1950. Excusing the published primary document collections which one would expect to see used here, such as Eliot's Debates and the collections of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, we are still left with an astonishingly high number of sources that are more than sixty years old, among them those which Puls cites most often. The scholarship of Bernard Bailyn, Robert Middlekauff, Pauline Maier, Edmund Morgan, Gordon Wood and many others cannot and should not be so casually cast aside - their omission here is frankly stunning (I should note that while some of their works are included in the bibliography they are rarely if ever cited in the text, and Puls seems to have made little effort to incorporate their views). Also, Puls' only source for quotes by and about Benjamin Franklin appears to be the 1982 The Real Benjamin Franklin, published by the National Center for Constitutional Studies and which seems rather suspect to me (there are many good Franklin biographies out there, it probably goes without saying).
If it'd been only the sources that I had trouble with, I would have minded some but probably would have gotten over it. Alas, there's much more. The book is afflicted with a staggering number of errors, ranging from the factual to the typographical. In the strangely-titled "Who is Who" section which precedes the text, Puls lists John Burgoyne as "British general who defeated American General Horatio Gates at Saratoga" (when of course it was the other way round, which Puls does manage to note correctly in both the entries on Gates and in the text). Richard Fifield is titled "Adam's father-in-law"; he was actually Sam's maternal grandfather. William Franklin (Ben's son) suddenly finds himself the royal governor of Pennsylvania rather than New Jersey.
On page 37, Puls inaccurately describes the procedure for smallpox inoculation used in the pre-Revolutionary period; on page 49 he writes "The English planned to encourage immigration to the interior regions of the continent," when actually the Proclamation of 1763 expressly limited such settlement except under certain approved conditions. The dates given for the repeal of the Townshend Duties and the Evacuation of Boston are incorrect, and Puls' depiction of the revisions of Jefferson's draft of the Declaration of Independence at the hands of Congress as "minor editing" is almost unbelievable. The British captain who was tried for his role in the Boston Massacre is alternately named Preston (his actual name), then Prescott, and then finally is back to his correct name by the time of his trial. Historian Benjamin Woods Labaree, author of the definitive work on the Boston Tea Party, is named Larabee throughout the text and the bibliography. And these are just the most serious mistakes which I happened to see; I have not mentioned the various spelling and other grammatical/typographical mistakes which ought to have been caught in the editing process.
Perhaps most galling of all is the lack of any sort of meaningful analysis of what is the key question about Adams in the years leading up to the Revolution: just what was his role in bringing about the Boston Massacre? Was there a secret plot to foment such an act, or was it simply a surprise event? Puls completely misses the ball on this question, failing even to discuss the various possible answers.
A final matter with which I must take exception is Puls' frustrating use of "Samuel Adams" throughout the book. The only time the word "Sam" ever appears is to note that's how Adams signed the Declaration of Independence. For the humble Adams, "Sam" seems to fit so much more nicely - Puls might have put it to good use.
While writing a biography of Sam Adams is trickier than for many of the other Framers (who never met a scrap of paper they didn't save), he deserves a cleaner and much more complete treatment than he's gotten from Mark Puls. I am unable to recommend this book in its current form.
While Puls' thesis (that Sam Adams played a vital role in bringing about the Revolution from a philosophical and public relations standpoint) is fundamentally sound and deserves a great deal of attention, his book contains multiple serious flaws which fatally undermine its entire structure.
Let me begin with what I view as one of the more substantial problems: sources. Puls' footnotes lead back, nearly all the time, to books which can hardly be described as at the forefront of modern historical scholarship. George Bancroft's History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent was published in 1882, while William Jackman's History of the American Nation came along in 1911. Both are cited repeatedly, as are Woodrow Wilson's History of the American People (1931) and the immediate post-Revolutionary histories of Mercy Otis Warren and William Gordon. All these are interesting in their own rights, it's true, but not exactly current. Puls' main sources for Adams' life appear to be the 1904 four-volume edition of his writings edited by Harry Alonzo Cushing and two earlier biographies (those of William Wells, published in 1865 and James Hosmer, which first appeared in 1884). Not once is a mention made of the Samuel Adams Papers which are mainly held by the New York Public Library. If Mr. Puls did any actual archival research at all, he certainly didn't make that fact particularly evident.
Of the 100 sources included in Puls' bibliography, exactly half were published prior to 1950. Excusing the published primary document collections which one would expect to see used here, such as Eliot's Debates and the collections of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, we are still left with an astonishingly high number of sources that are more than sixty years old, among them those which Puls cites most often. The scholarship of Bernard Bailyn, Robert Middlekauff, Pauline Maier, Edmund Morgan, Gordon Wood and many others cannot and should not be so casually cast aside - their omission here is frankly stunning (I should note that while some of their works are included in the bibliography they are rarely if ever cited in the text, and Puls seems to have made little effort to incorporate their views). Also, Puls' only source for quotes by and about Benjamin Franklin appears to be the 1982 The Real Benjamin Franklin, published by the National Center for Constitutional Studies and which seems rather suspect to me (there are many good Franklin biographies out there, it probably goes without saying).
If it'd been only the sources that I had trouble with, I would have minded some but probably would have gotten over it. Alas, there's much more. The book is afflicted with a staggering number of errors, ranging from the factual to the typographical. In the strangely-titled "Who is Who" section which precedes the text, Puls lists John Burgoyne as "British general who defeated American General Horatio Gates at Saratoga" (when of course it was the other way round, which Puls does manage to note correctly in both the entries on Gates and in the text). Richard Fifield is titled "Adam's father-in-law"; he was actually Sam's maternal grandfather. William Franklin (Ben's son) suddenly finds himself the royal governor of Pennsylvania rather than New Jersey.
On page 37, Puls inaccurately describes the procedure for smallpox inoculation used in the pre-Revolutionary period; on page 49 he writes "The English planned to encourage immigration to the interior regions of the continent," when actually the Proclamation of 1763 expressly limited such settlement except under certain approved conditions. The dates given for the repeal of the Townshend Duties and the Evacuation of Boston are incorrect, and Puls' depiction of the revisions of Jefferson's draft of the Declaration of Independence at the hands of Congress as "minor editing" is almost unbelievable. The British captain who was tried for his role in the Boston Massacre is alternately named Preston (his actual name), then Prescott, and then finally is back to his correct name by the time of his trial. Historian Benjamin Woods Labaree, author of the definitive work on the Boston Tea Party, is named Larabee throughout the text and the bibliography. And these are just the most serious mistakes which I happened to see; I have not mentioned the various spelling and other grammatical/typographical mistakes which ought to have been caught in the editing process.
Perhaps most galling of all is the lack of any sort of meaningful analysis of what is the key question about Adams in the years leading up to the Revolution: just what was his role in bringing about the Boston Massacre? Was there a secret plot to foment such an act, or was it simply a surprise event? Puls completely misses the ball on this question, failing even to discuss the various possible answers.
A final matter with which I must take exception is Puls' frustrating use of "Samuel Adams" throughout the book. The only time the word "Sam" ever appears is to note that's how Adams signed the Declaration of Independence. For the humble Adams, "Sam" seems to fit so much more nicely - Puls might have put it to good use.
While writing a biography of Sam Adams is trickier than for many of the other Framers (who never met a scrap of paper they didn't save), he deserves a cleaner and much more complete treatment than he's gotten from Mark Puls. I am unable to recommend this book in its current form.
Book Review: "The Book of Fate"
Brad Meltzer's latest potboiler, The Book of Fate, is another "political thriller" filled with nefarious plots and grand conspiracies, assassination attempts and various surprising moments of spycraft. It's not great. But it's a quick, semi-suspenseful read even if the conclusion doesn't end up being a surprise at all. The only real quibble I had with it was how Meltzer tried to work in the Freemasons, but never quite managed to do it effectively ... making it appear a half-baked contrivance designed to cash in on the Da Vinci Code-inspired cabal-mania.
Nothing special, but not awful.
Nothing special, but not awful.
Friday, October 27, 2006
Book Review: "The Partly Cloudy Patriot"
Sarah Vowell's 2002 book of essays, The Partly-Cloudy Patriot, is one of those books that you find yourself alternating between laughing at and nodding along to. Filled as it is with the angst that I suspect many of us have felt since 9/11 and during its various aftermaths, Vowell's musings on America, its history and its culture resonated - and at the same time, her quirky delvings into bizarre little nooks and crannies of American life are enough to bring on a fit of laughter that will draw stares from across the T-car.
From Tom Cruise's hair to Al Gore's "Love Canal moment" in campaign 2000, from "The Patriot" to Tom Landry to Salem's Gallows Hill and the lunchroom in Carlsbad Caverns, Vowell's wry, witty humor and knack for a good story carry this book along nicely. I quite enjoyed it.
From Tom Cruise's hair to Al Gore's "Love Canal moment" in campaign 2000, from "The Patriot" to Tom Landry to Salem's Gallows Hill and the lunchroom in Carlsbad Caverns, Vowell's wry, witty humor and knack for a good story carry this book along nicely. I quite enjoyed it.
Couple Good Links
- On the AHA blog, Elisabeth Grant has a post designed to begin a discussion about the usefulness of Wikipedia, asking "Can we trust it?" Some great links to articles and other debates as well, so read and feel free to chime in.
- GalleyCat reports that rising Democratic powerhouse Barack Obama's books are, for the moment at least, quite pricey under certain conditions. They note a signed first of Dreams of my Fathers is listed on ABE for $1,698, and found a copy of Obama's newest book The Audacity of Hope listed at $220. Now someone's just got to buy them.
- I've got some reviews cooking for tonight or tomorrow (and one of them's gonna be a doozy). And speaking of reviews, don't miss this review of Charles Frazier's Thirteen Moons by our friend Ed at Bibliothecary. Definitely not a book I'll be rushing out to buy!
- GalleyCat reports that rising Democratic powerhouse Barack Obama's books are, for the moment at least, quite pricey under certain conditions. They note a signed first of Dreams of my Fathers is listed on ABE for $1,698, and found a copy of Obama's newest book The Audacity of Hope listed at $220. Now someone's just got to buy them.
- I've got some reviews cooking for tonight or tomorrow (and one of them's gonna be a doozy). And speaking of reviews, don't miss this review of Charles Frazier's Thirteen Moons by our friend Ed at Bibliothecary. Definitely not a book I'll be rushing out to buy!
Thursday, October 26, 2006
More on Buckley's (Non)Sentence
As I expected he would, Grumpy Old Bookman has posted some thoughts on the Buckley sentencing; his views seem to jive pretty closely with mine (had I been drinking coffee yesterday morning I would almost certainly have sprayed it everywhere). Also don't miss the comments, including one from Clive Keeble, the antiques dealer who was largely responsible for the discovery of Buckley's dirty deeds.
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Thieving Librarian Slapped with Wet Noodle (Barely)
Former librarian Norman Buckley, who stole more than 450 rare books and other items worth upwards of £175,000 from the Manchester Central Library so that he could sell them over the internet, was sentenced today to 250 hours of community service, the BBC reports. He also received a 15-month jail term, but that's been suspended for two years and he'll probably never serve it.
"Judge Clement Goldstone QC told Buckley his sentence was suspended because he had helped police find the books, which the judge described as part of the city's 'literary heritage'. 'Every time you offered a book for sale, you were breaking the trust that had been placed in you. The ultimate loss to the city and its heritage may have been measured, if it can be measured at all, in the thousands of pounds rather than the tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds. You have bought shame on yourself and your family by your behaviour.'"
I don't even have the words to express how stunned I am at this (although considering the recent Smiley verdicts I suppose I shouldn't be surprised). This is an absolutely ridiculous sentence for such an outrage against our cultural heritage. Buckley should have been made an example of. Instead, as the Guardian notes, he "walked free from court."
Something's wrong with this picture.
"Judge Clement Goldstone QC told Buckley his sentence was suspended because he had helped police find the books, which the judge described as part of the city's 'literary heritage'. 'Every time you offered a book for sale, you were breaking the trust that had been placed in you. The ultimate loss to the city and its heritage may have been measured, if it can be measured at all, in the thousands of pounds rather than the tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds. You have bought shame on yourself and your family by your behaviour.'"
I don't even have the words to express how stunned I am at this (although considering the recent Smiley verdicts I suppose I shouldn't be surprised). This is an absolutely ridiculous sentence for such an outrage against our cultural heritage. Buckley should have been made an example of. Instead, as the Guardian notes, he "walked free from court."
Something's wrong with this picture.
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Conserving MD's "Birds of America"
Thought I'd posted this yesterday, but must have forgotten!
The Baltimore Sun has an interesting piece about the conservation work being done on the "Birds of America" elephant folios belonging to the Maryland State Law Library (first discussed here back in September). This story focuses on the actual conservation measures being taken at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts in Philadelphia to clean up the plates. Most of the work is reasonably conventional, although I was surprised to learn that they decided to digitally reproduce a foot for the damaged wild turkey.
The Baltimore Sun has an interesting piece about the conservation work being done on the "Birds of America" elephant folios belonging to the Maryland State Law Library (first discussed here back in September). This story focuses on the actual conservation measures being taken at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts in Philadelphia to clean up the plates. Most of the work is reasonably conventional, although I was surprised to learn that they decided to digitally reproduce a foot for the damaged wild turkey.
Monday, October 23, 2006
Book Review: "Mr. Darwin's Shooter"
Roger McDonald's Mr. Darwin's Shooter caught my eye in the stacks at the shop a few weeks ago, and I've been slowly reading it bit by bit on the T since then. It's quite a nice piece of historical fiction, highlighting the little-known character Syms Covington. Darwin's erstwhile assistant on the Beagle voyage and longtime correspondent thereafter, Covington is an enigmatic character, who left a narrow paper trail (online here) and more than a few mysteries.
McDonald's narrative takes place in two time periods: one plot-line follows Covington through his early years and along with Darwin on his travels, while the second portrays him as an aging man in Australia awaiting the arrival of Darwin's On the Origin of Species. This device is put to excellent use here; it allows McDonald to introduce a welcome element of suspense and curiosity into the excellently-written narrative.
The tensions in this book are the tensions that have always followed Darwin: as a man of great religious conviction Covington, is profoundly troubled at the conclusions to which his observations lead him (before, it is suggested, they led Darwin to the same place). McDonald handles these tensions well, and has fashioned from them a very good book.
McDonald's narrative takes place in two time periods: one plot-line follows Covington through his early years and along with Darwin on his travels, while the second portrays him as an aging man in Australia awaiting the arrival of Darwin's On the Origin of Species. This device is put to excellent use here; it allows McDonald to introduce a welcome element of suspense and curiosity into the excellently-written narrative.
The tensions in this book are the tensions that have always followed Darwin: as a man of great religious conviction Covington, is profoundly troubled at the conclusions to which his observations lead him (before, it is suggested, they led Darwin to the same place). McDonald handles these tensions well, and has fashioned from them a very good book.
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Darwin's Works Online
The Guardian reported Thursday about a new effort by Cambridge University to put all of Charles Darwin's works online. Some 50,000 pages of text (entirely searchable), as well as "tens of thousands of images, many from previously unpublished manuscripts, together with notebooks, diaries and original publications such as The Origin of Species, The Voyage of the Beagle (the Journal of Researches) and The Descent of Man." There will even be audio versions of some key works.
"'Nowhere possesses this complete collection. It's a complete run of his papers which has never been assembled in any form anywhere,' said John van Wyhe, director of The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online project."
Another great resource!
The URL for the project is http://darwin-online.org.uk/.
[h/t: Shelf:Life]
"'Nowhere possesses this complete collection. It's a complete run of his papers which has never been assembled in any form anywhere,' said John van Wyhe, director of The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online project."
Another great resource!
The URL for the project is http://darwin-online.org.uk/.
[h/t: Shelf:Life]
Saturday, October 21, 2006
To Talk of Many Things
Now, a few of the whole bunch of things I meant to/wanted to link to this week and didn't quite get time for:
- Scott Brown at Fine Books Blog had a couple great posts, including one on the selling of advance readers' copies and how it's not illegal, and another on what errors in the production process make books more valuable as compared to completely worthless.
- Joyce at Bibliophile Bullpen posted a list of terms that (some) booksellers have for their, eh, less than perfect customers. Quite amusing.
- Over at LibraryThing, Tim has kicked the addictiveness level up a notch with a new series of "challenge" contests, in which users try to wend their way from one tag to another using only "related tags" (i.e. "Tarzan" to "Iceland", etc.). It's great, but as I commented to him, introducing it in the middle of a semester ... now that's just cruel!
- Scott Brown at Fine Books Blog had a couple great posts, including one on the selling of advance readers' copies and how it's not illegal, and another on what errors in the production process make books more valuable as compared to completely worthless.
- Joyce at Bibliophile Bullpen posted a list of terms that (some) booksellers have for their, eh, less than perfect customers. Quite amusing.
- Over at LibraryThing, Tim has kicked the addictiveness level up a notch with a new series of "challenge" contests, in which users try to wend their way from one tag to another using only "related tags" (i.e. "Tarzan" to "Iceland", etc.). It's great, but as I commented to him, introducing it in the middle of a semester ... now that's just cruel!
Archives-Wiki from AHA
The AHA (American Historical Association) has started a blog (linked added to sidebar), AHA Today. So far, I'm really enjoying the content. Today they've got a few recommended history web sites, but earlier this week they ran a two-part series on a big project they're working on rolling out: Archives-wiki. Part one focuses on the proposal and the reasons behind it, while Part two gets down to the nitty-gritty of how the wiki is envisioned.
I think this idea has terrific merit and great potential. As the first post notes, "this project will serve three important functions - assisting historians in their research, developing a new network of community within the discipline and with related research fields, while also allowing the Association to work with and promote a new type of technology."
The second post focuses on the various technological and practical considerations that are going into this, including the criteria to be included, the need for some safeguards, and the worry that historians won't participate. As is made clear, this is still in the beginning stages, with many kinks still to be ironed out.
Robert Townsend, AHA's Assistant Director for Research and Publications, is their point-person on this project, and has invited interested folks to contact him with thoughts and ideas. This is certainly something I'll be keeping an eye on!
I think this idea has terrific merit and great potential. As the first post notes, "this project will serve three important functions - assisting historians in their research, developing a new network of community within the discipline and with related research fields, while also allowing the Association to work with and promote a new type of technology."
The second post focuses on the various technological and practical considerations that are going into this, including the criteria to be included, the need for some safeguards, and the worry that historians won't participate. As is made clear, this is still in the beginning stages, with many kinks still to be ironed out.
Robert Townsend, AHA's Assistant Director for Research and Publications, is their point-person on this project, and has invited interested folks to contact him with thoughts and ideas. This is certainly something I'll be keeping an eye on!
Friday, October 20, 2006
Book Review: "Dante"
Prominent Dante scholar Barbara Reynolds has penned a revealing new biography of her subject in Dante: The Poet, the Political Thinker, the Man. While some of her conclusions will almost certainly be controversial, Reynolds' close studies of Dante's works taken as a whole as well as her clear grasp of current Dante scholarship form what seems a fairly solid base. I certainly am not nearly expert enough to dispute her.
This was not an easy book to read, largely because it is hardly a conventional biography at all. While some chapters focus on Dante's life and its events, Reynolds is largely concerned with interpreting those events and Dante's works. It is at its best in the center portion, where Reynolds discusses the early poems and essays followed by Dante's magnum opus, the Commedia. In a fascinating tour through the cantos of Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso Reynolds dissects those works, drawing out the various real-world events and people which feature, as well as analyzing the relationship(s) between Dante and his guides along the journey. Reynolds seeks a unifying theme in Dante's works, and finds one in his support for secular authority (in the form of the Holy Roman Emperor) rather than ecclesiastical preeminence (i.e. the Pope).
In the more biographical sections, this book would have benefited from some editorial oversight. Many chapters end with some form of "and we will take up [topic x] in the next chapter", which is rather jarring in a book like this and disrupted the narrative unecessarily. It's not a light read either, and I can't say I recommend it unless you happen to be a very serious Dante aficionado (or aspire to be such, I suppose). It was interesting, but I can't help but think there must be a more standard biography out there that would be more useful for most purposes (including, it should be said, my own).
One important note (and what partly prompted me to get this book): the jacket illustration - which shows Dante as depicted in a Luca Signorelli fresco in Orvieto - is quite lovely, and I happen to have a framed print of it hanging on my wall. I must say, it's pretty weird to be walking through a bookstore and suddenly seeing a picture from your wall on a book jacket!
This was not an easy book to read, largely because it is hardly a conventional biography at all. While some chapters focus on Dante's life and its events, Reynolds is largely concerned with interpreting those events and Dante's works. It is at its best in the center portion, where Reynolds discusses the early poems and essays followed by Dante's magnum opus, the Commedia. In a fascinating tour through the cantos of Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso Reynolds dissects those works, drawing out the various real-world events and people which feature, as well as analyzing the relationship(s) between Dante and his guides along the journey. Reynolds seeks a unifying theme in Dante's works, and finds one in his support for secular authority (in the form of the Holy Roman Emperor) rather than ecclesiastical preeminence (i.e. the Pope).
In the more biographical sections, this book would have benefited from some editorial oversight. Many chapters end with some form of "and we will take up [topic x] in the next chapter", which is rather jarring in a book like this and disrupted the narrative unecessarily. It's not a light read either, and I can't say I recommend it unless you happen to be a very serious Dante aficionado (or aspire to be such, I suppose). It was interesting, but I can't help but think there must be a more standard biography out there that would be more useful for most purposes (including, it should be said, my own).
One important note (and what partly prompted me to get this book): the jacket illustration - which shows Dante as depicted in a Luca Signorelli fresco in Orvieto - is quite lovely, and I happen to have a framed print of it hanging on my wall. I must say, it's pretty weird to be walking through a bookstore and suddenly seeing a picture from your wall on a book jacket!
Audubon Conference Tomorrow
With many apologies for the short notice, I wanted to point out that there will be a one-day conference on John James Audubon tomorrow at the Rensselaerville Institute, near Albany, NY. Events will include a roundtable conference on Audubon's books, as well as the premiere of a new PBS film "John James Audubon: Drawn from Nature."
"A $40 registration fee is required to attend the 1 p.m. conference, hosted by the Edmund Niles Huyck Preserve. If you're just interested in the film, $5 buys you entry to a second screening at 8:30 p.m." The conference was organized by Roswell Eldridge, a local Audubon enthusiast who will be showing off his ten volume set of Audubon "octavos" (seven volumes of the Birds, three of the Quadrupeds).
I'm pretty sorry to miss this event, but I will certainly look forward to the PBS film.
"A $40 registration fee is required to attend the 1 p.m. conference, hosted by the Edmund Niles Huyck Preserve. If you're just interested in the film, $5 buys you entry to a second screening at 8:30 p.m." The conference was organized by Roswell Eldridge, a local Audubon enthusiast who will be showing off his ten volume set of Audubon "octavos" (seven volumes of the Birds, three of the Quadrupeds).
I'm pretty sorry to miss this event, but I will certainly look forward to the PBS film.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
Francis Frith Photograph Book Donated
An Oxfam bookshop in Exeter received a "diamond in the rough" in July - a book containing early photographs of the Middle East worth about £4,500. Francis Frith's "Sinai & Palestine," printed in 1862, contains 37 photographic prints: street scenes, panoramic views, and other images.
A volunteer book-pricer recognized the name of the photographer and decided to do a little research on the book, discovering that a similar copy recently sold at auction for £5,000. "Sinai & Palestine" is now for sale at a London shop, with proceeds to go back to Oxfam.
A volunteer book-pricer recognized the name of the photographer and decided to do a little research on the book, discovering that a similar copy recently sold at auction for £5,000. "Sinai & Palestine" is now for sale at a London shop, with proceeds to go back to Oxfam.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Courant Reporter to Speak on Smiley
Kim Martineau of the Hartford Courant, who was responsible for much of her paper's coverage of the E. Forbes Smiley case, will speak at the Washington Map Society on Thursday, November 16 at 7 p.m. on "The Case of E. Forbes Smiley." More information here.
[Via Everett Wilkie]
[Via Everett Wilkie]
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