April 2017

The Book

We may love books, but do we know what lies behind them? In The Book, Keith Houston reveals that the paper, ink, thread, glue, and board from which a book is made tell as rich a story as the words on its pages―of civilizations, empires, human ingenuity, and madness. In an invitingly tactile history of this 2,000-year-old medium, Houston follows the development of writing, printing, the art of illustrations, and binding to show how we have moved from cuneiform tablets and papyrus scrolls to the hardcovers and paperbacks of today. Sure to delight book lovers of all stripes with its lush, full-color illustrations, The Book gives us the momentous and surprising history behind humanity’s most important―and universal―information technology.

The Book

Winner of the Peeps Diorama Contest from The Washington City Paper.

If you do a Google search for “card catalog” it will likely return Pinterest-worthy images of antique furniture for sale — boxy, wooden cabinets with tiny drawers, great for storing knick-knacks, jewelry or art supplies.

But before these cabinets held household objects, they held countless index cards — which, at the time, were the pathways to knowledge and information. A new book from the Library of Congress celebrates these catalogs as the analog ancestor of the search engine.

Full story on NPR

Bill Cosby’s “Little Bill” children’s book series was among the 10 “most challenged” books in 2016, according to a list compiled by the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom.

It’s the first time the Cosby series has attracted a complaint, the organization said. The “Little Bill” books, first published in 1997, tell the adventures of Bill Jr., a 5-year-old Philadelphia boy. Story from the New York Times.

You guessed it, the notebooks of Marie Curie.

Via Open Culture, here’s a report on the papers and other belongings of the discoverer of polonium and radium, Marie Curie who worked in her future husband Pierre’s lab. (I love that movie).

Her notebooks, her clothing, her furniture, pretty much everything surviving from her Parisian suburban house, is radioactive, and will be for 1,500 years or more.

If you want to look at her manuscripts, you have to sign a liability waiver at France’s Bibliotheque Nationale, and then you can access the notes that are sealed in a lead-lined box.

Librarians like Peeps, right? Can someone please explain (in the comments) how this came to be?

Anyway, here’s a recipe for culinarily ambitious librarians (and others) who want to make delicious honey saffron-scented HOMEMADE PEEPS!!

From the New York Times Melissa Clarks thoughts about her Peeps project. And here is the recipe should you choose to undertake it.

The Dictionary of the Book: A Glossary for Book Collectors, Booksellers, Librarians, and Others

First published in 1952 with eight revised later editions, the ABC for Book Collectors by John Carter has long served as the standard glossary for the book trade. Nicely illustrated with photographs and drawings, The Dictionary of the Book updates Carter’s classic volume with additional coverage on book-printing terms, typography, papermaking, and binding, among other topics. A former museum library director and curator of manuscripts at different institutions, Berger is highly qualified to compile this informative and important work. A venerable bibliophile who delights in all aspects of book production and history, he hopes the readers will get as much ‘pleasure out of this book’ as he did in compiling it. (Booklist)

Berger is a passionate bibliomaniac with a scholar’s eye for details and a bibliophile’s eye for the beauty in the details. He takes a language defined (now) long ago by John Carter and refined more recently by Nicolas Barker and brings it into the 21st century with a deft blend of deference and irreverence and more than a dash of humor, to make learning the arcane patois of books an educational treat and a great read. He adds from his own vast knowledge and experience a fresh perspective which will delight beginners and cognoscenti alike, and offers us all a chance to look afresh at our world of books. (John Windle, Owner, John Windle Antiquarian Bookseller in San Francisco)

The Dictionary of the Book is a reference work that is as wide-ranging and encyclopedic as its author. Sid Berger has produced an essential tool for the trade. (Phil Salmon, Bromer Booksellers)

This is not an ABC of book terms, this is an A to Z of all things bookish! From bookbinding to paper making to library terminology, this glossary leaves nothing out and its definitions are clear, concise and on target. No librarian’s shelf should be without it. (Valerie Hotchkiss, Andrew S. G. Turyn Endowed Professor & Director of the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, University of Illinois)