Tempting …

… and only slithtly rubbed, too!

(found while sleep-shopping on Abe Books)

Pimp My Uppity Colonials

It's been a long time since "Pimp My Dante" and I feel the need for some more biblioporn and am lured by the sirens' call to fondle some leather.

This time it's the loving rebinding in period clothing of some tattered and disbound documents pertinent to my friends in the Colonies which I hope they might find diverting.

 Yes, it's all very brown.

I do love a bargain and the interweb is the perfect place to trawl the back rooms and musty corners of the world's bookshops, ready to pounce on any unwary prey that takes my fancy. Disbound or with their covers hanging off and spines broken they can be obtained for astonishingly few groats, and even if you don't re-skin them they make wonderful reading.
In particular I am obsessed (yes, I confess to obsession … sorry, Mum) with collecting old news as it happened and original documents and letters from revolutions and revolts, being pretty revolting myself.

The rather alarming duct tape binding above contains the first appearance in a printed book - as opposed to manuscript or pamphlet - of the American Declaration of Independence (amongst the Parliamentary State Papers for 1776, bound in with the hugely entertaining and divers debates and correspondence leading up to said Declaration and its wake of amusing spuffle, blather and faff from the outraged English Tories).

If, like me, you find duct tape an inappropriate cladding for the most sacred of uppity Colonial documents, read on.

 Here lay the tattered remains of many debates, rants, arguments and handbag fights in both the English Parliament and the Philadelphia Congress.

It is distressing to see such distressed damsels déshabillé and so I sought the aid of Bald Bernard from the Basement in hope of restoring their dignity.

 And now here they sit betwixt first editions of Titus Groan, Gormenghast, Mishima and McCarthy and some beautiful Rivière Brothers bindings that - after some haggling regarding beards and gourds - some fool let me buy for £3.55 a volume, at least a hundred times less than their current value.
Like I say: I do love a bargain.

Anyhoo … Back to Bald Bernard from the Basement …

While I was working in London I used Shepherds' for my bookbinding needs. Not because they were only a few yards from my office on Rochester Row but because they are the current equivalent of Bayntun and Rivière; the best of the best of the best … Sir!

And down in their basement toiled bald Bernard, master of calf and hand-stitching, and his wife Sarah, queen of fine leather mosaic work.

When I returned to Norwich, Bernard and Sarah decided it was time to start their own bindery and by serendipitous chance, concluded that the best place for a bindery would be the UNESCO City of Literature … er … Norwich; home to more fine writers than you can shake a stick at (should you choose to do so).

 And so …

Our damsels are no longer déshabillé but clad in new mottled calf that I am instructed to fondle as often as possible, the natural oils from skin being the the perfect food and preservative for new, deliciously soft calf-bound books. As these are books that I will read and re-read and enjoy for as long as I live, fondling them is not going to be too Herculean a labour.

 For the endpapers we spent some time with marvellous rolls of hand-marbled paper, choosing a style and colour consistent with the 1770s. Bernard is as fussy about period veracity as I am.

 The hand-stitching matches the endpapers and Bernard worked really hard adjusting the raised bands on the spines to align across all the volumes.

 Here, starting in the last column is the first printed and published version of that most sacred of Colonial scriptures, clad no longer in duct tape but in a more fitting and dignified wrapper.

 And here is one of my very favourite documents. In essence it is a bonkers, Trump-style splenetic rant refuting in eye-popping apoplexy the document bound with it (see below).

The British Library's English Short Title Catalogue (they keep tabs on printed material from the 1470s up to 1800) lists three of these still in existence and I am rather chuffed that mine is the copy from the "New Exchange Coffee House Subscription Library" (copperplated over several pages to discourage pilfering).

The New Exchange (now the beautiful and dignified Old Exchange) was the stock exchange of its time, nestled between Threadneedle Street and Cornhill, whose coffee houses were the debating chambers for politicians, scientists and the more enlightened of Enlightenment society.

The New Exchange Coffee House was the grandest and would have seen Edmund Burke and John Dodsley, Charles James Fox and William Pitt (both versions) and on occasion Benjamin Franklin reading, debating and getting caffeinated to the gills.

Riff-raff like stockbrokers were not allowed in and had their own coffee house down the street.

Here's the document from July, 1775 (bound at the back of the above volume) that kicked off the petulant, foot-stamping temper tantrum, which, by the way, makes for hilarious and really quite shocking reading, though you'll have to take my word for that unless you manage to track down one of the other two remaining copies.
James Ranty MacPherson takes particular umbrage at the concept of no taxation without representation, citing that women and (let us say 'persons of colour') together with the poor have no vote and therefore no representation and yet are taxed by the divine right of the monarch. He then goes a leetle bit apeshit and his views are unfortunately those of the Tories (most of whom "owned" millions of square miles of Colonial soil by dint of having simply given it to themselves) and not those of reason. Regrettably his views are also those of today's "one percent" and those of the GOP. What the hell happened to the enlightened views of Jefferson, Franklin, Adams et al? Whither America in the 21st. Century?
…
At the lower left of the above photo, however, Bostonians may find some amusement.
The blustering, indignant and quite frankly chortlesome abuse MacPherson rains on Boston and its inhabitants in his main text would be unpublishable today. It is beyond Trump for sheer ignorant insanity. Pop round for a cuppa and I'll let you read it.

Good old Johnny Hancock really did know how to raise the hackles of the English Tories.
You can gauge the tone of the major part of the book by the paragraph at the top right.
The certain "Illustrious Band" referred to being the Whigs, whose arguments recorded in the Parliamentary Papers were rational, reasonable, occasionally hilariously sarcastic and personal. The Whigs of course sided wholly with the Americans and their perfectly reasonable grievances but unfortunately, as today, the Tories won the vote by lying, cheating (using rotten boroughs and bribery) and bullying and of course calamity ensued.

Here beginneth Colonial Independence.

Better Living Through Sleep-Shopping

It never ceases to amaze me what you can pick up for a pittance on the interweb.

Herbert Morrison's personal, signed, pre-publication copy of the Victor Gollancz

"A Handbook of Marxism"

which will have sat on his shelf all through the War and his time as Churchill's Minister of Supply, then through the glorious birth of the NHS and his Deputy Prime-Ministership.

Now it's MINE! Bwa-ha-haaa …

Nobody seems to want lefty history, so for as little as £1.99 a book I've amassed quite a little lefty library of signed firsts from the likes of Harold Wilson, Ralph Miliband, Tony Benn, Michael Foot, Dennis Skinner, Clement Attlee and more.
They're great reads, one and all.
Somebody has to believe in Socialism's beautiful dream so it might as well be me.

I got this one sleep-shopping.

We had a cracking thunderstorm a few nights back and I remember waking up around three and going for a glass of water. I must have grabbed my laptop on the way back to bed and shopped in my sleep (I'm prone to it) as I have no memory of ordering this.

The confirmation email the following morning was a delightful surprise.

So … Happy Old Dive. I heartily recommend sleep-shopping.
I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

It's Gruesome … Ew. It's GrewSome More!

Apropos of nothing at all, I've been indulging in a particular passion of mine: the pre-1800 Annual Registers.

In the 1784 volume, after all the political and international events, state papers, book reviews, poetry and general goings-on, I came across this peculiarly gruesome article, which I lay before you for your curious pleasure (or to gross you out).

Doctor Martineau was uncle of the utterly splendid Harriet Martineau and I for one am glad that he felt the need to regale the world with his fat little lady and her 6,631 pints of water.

It is worth clicking on the photos to blow them up to readable size and then trying not to be put off your coffee.

Ew …

There are divers and numerous accounts of a peculiar nature in the Annual Registers - of which I own far too many/not nearly enough (delete where applicable, unless you're Mum who thinks I have enough books … HA).

Bodysnatchers, murder most horrid, guillotining Froggy toffs in the French Revolution, furious - and hugely entertaining - arguments with the uppity Colonials, leading to their independence, witches, madness and wildly inaccurate scientific speculation … and much more.

Look out for more of them in the coming months.

What was YOUR Teen Bible?

I was at the Blickling Hall Rare Book Fair today and - blesséd be the hairy red arse of the god of all things cool - found me one of the original pre-publication bootleg copies of the daily Bible of my teenage years, Dylan's Tarantula.

Rubber stamped and mimeographed and rusty-stapled and cool as fuck.

So now that I'm happy, let me know what was the book that ruled your teenaged years back in the days when we knew nuthin' about nuthin'?

Man Flu

I wake up, semi-delirious,
certain I can hear voices,
but there's no-one there when I check the house;
just my books, shuffling about,
surreptitiously
rearranging themselves behind my back
and murmuring;
reading to one another
when they think I'm asleep.

I'm convinced they're up to something.
Keep that amount of words in a confined space
and there's sure to be
mischief.

Transports of Delight

Yesterday, my kindly postie left me a long-awaited package and I must confess to being utterly delighted with its contents.
I have spent the past year amazed; not that so many of my friends have had books published, but at the astonishingly high quality of those books. First came Margaret's hilarious and touching "The Goddess Lounge", then Petrea's brilliant "Camelot and Vine", every page of which left me thinking "This woman can really WRITE" and feeling slightly guilty that I had not expected that from a friend.

Norm (Mr.M) of course is a long established and far-famed poet, music and architecture critic, jazz historian and just an all round brilliant guy, and Katherine now has a list of books as long as your arm (though Poems From The Battlefield holds a special place in my heart).

My oldest and bestest blogpal Robyn has written a slow-burn masterpiece of American Realism that still awaits a lucky publisher, our Lynn has a startlingly good book in the same situation, Vanda has a whole bunch of books published (which I love but which are written under a pseudonym and kept off here to protect the innocent) and even my dear neighbour Gerry is in on the act, having spent the past four years crafting a tautly plotted and beautifully written thriller set in Berlin (where he lived and worked at the end of the Cold War) and which we sent off to his agent last week and toasted with rather too much wine and grappa.

And now here comes Sara's masterful survey of the history of the American steamboat (one of which she used to own), a subject that has fascinated me since I was a little boy lost in Mark Twain.

Meticulously researched by a woman who really knows - and loves - her subject …

 … written in a gorgeous prose style filled with the fabulous imagery of someone whose life has been spent as a professional artist and photographer (and blogger) …

… and lavishly illustrated with maps, paintings and glorious period photographs, this is a gem of a book and I am loving every minute of reading it. It shall sit happily between Twain's Autobiography and his Life on the Mississippi.
A hearty cheer, too, for Shire Books for the extremely high quality of reproduction and layout.

The season of summer reading is upon us so follow the links and go shopping:

Sara's "Steamboats - Icons of America's Rivers"

Petrea's "Camelot and Vine"

Margaret's "The Goddess Lounge"

Katherine's Amazon page

Norm's "No Wrong Notes" (Amazon keep muddling him up with a similarly named chef so you have to filter through to find the poetry and prose).

Robyn, Lynn and Gerry will no doubt follow and Vanda remains a secret delight all her own.
I'm going to have to learn how to write so I can play with you guys.

Pimp My Dante

Hoorah for Lynn!
She's saved me the bother of actually writing about anything today by asking that I post a few pics of some of my books to tie in with the DPP folks' Books Theme Day.

Some of you know that I kinda like to read.
A seven hour per day commute, plus reading myself to sleep at night and my weekends spent in the big old reading chair all add up to a whole lot of book time.

Plus I don't watch TV. It's Radio 3 and a good book for me every time. The picture is always so much better.

So anyhoo … This is the part of my dining room cum office where I keep some of my favourite books.

Ever since college I've been trading up my tatty and much-loved paperbacks for hardbacks and then fine editions, like the facsimile of Shakespeare's First Folio sitting here next to my Kelmscott Chaucer.

If I'm going to read a book over and over then it may as well look and feel nice.
This is Shakespeare's Sonnets tarted up in leather and crushed silk, which looks either blue or deep red depending on how the light catches it … Groovy!

Pimp my Dante. Morocco and moiré silk bindings.

Here's my big old Chaucer. It's in the original Middle English and I love reading aloud from it on winter nights.
The book was produced by William Morris and Edward Burne Jones with their exquisite designs bringing the words to life. Click on any of these to make 'em a little bigger.

I have a fair few Bibles knocking about the place, but this is my favourite if I want to read the Gospels.
Eric Gill was probably our greatest stonemason and engraver (he also designed fonts, such as Gill sans).
The Golden Cockerel Press commissioned him to produce this so that people could read Jesus' words in a book fit for them.

Here's an apt passage for the coming season.

Gill's beautiful, stylised illustrations and hand-carved fonts fit the text perfectly.

Enough of that. Let's browse some shelves.
Here be Dickens. My primary winter fodder, together with Tolstoy.
That's Smollett's History of England - the 1756 edition - on the middle shelf, from back in the days before those pesky Colonials rebelled.

Up here we have more Shakespeare and Winston Churchill's war books from The Great War and World War 2, together with his History of the English Speaking Peoples.

Hey ho … Moving on: Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in a nice vellum binding with Hodgkin's brilliant Barbarian Invasions books (in Roman imperial purple) taking us through from the fall of Rome to Charlemagne.

Under those are T.E. Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom and Pepys' Diaries with a few battered old Dickens first editions I've had for donkey's years.

More general fiction, plus Darwin's writings to annoy our Godbotherers and various other odds and sods.

We'll whizz through the remaining bookshelves in the dining room.
Here's some art stuff.

Architecture and cookery and general nonsense.

Homer, Aristotle, Plato, Plutarch, Tacitus, etc. You get the picture.

English history, Stanley's In Darkest Africa next to Livingstone's diary and on the top shelf the lovely Complete Peanuts series that Fantagraphics have been bringing out, two per year.

Look out! It's the God shelf.
My big Bible, a couple of Qur'ans - including Tarif Khalidi's stunning new translation; more stuff to freak Shan out (The Gnostic Gospels and The Book of Common Prayer) together with a smattering of reference works on Christianity and Islam and associated bumf.

And to go with religion … politics.

Marx, Cuba, Palestine, good guys like Benn, Lenin, Cromwell, Arafat, Castro and Ho Chi Minh; bad guys like Hitler, Stalin, Kissinger and Nixon.
Plus Chomsky on the Yanks.
Fun and games for all the family.

My totally trashed old Roget and his chums.

More stuff on American history and the folly of war.

And more lessons from the past from which nobody appears to have learned a damned thing.

A good shelf for general reading. Orwell, Steinbeck, Swift, Melville, Hugo, Marquez, Eco, Conrad, Solzhenitsyn et al, including To Kill A Mockingbird (for Robyn) and Maya Angelou.

More tosh, including some of those fun old Punch compilations that seem to find their way into everybody's library.

An odd shelf; from Einsten to Mark Twain.
It really annoys me when people say "I read A Brief History Of Time but didn't understand it".
Twats!
It is the best introductory physics book for twelve year olds ever written. Stick Hawking alongside Newton's Principia Mathematica, Richard Feynman's quantum physics lectures, Einstein's own book on Relativity and Schrödinger on genetics and you have the basics for understanding what the fuck is going on.
I honestly can't understand people who can't understand this stuff.
Sheesh!

Moving on again … Some old paperbacks including my much travelled and trashed copies of Dylan's Tarantula, The Catcher In The Rye and a bunch of Burroughs.

Some old Solzhenitsyns and general stuff.

Moving away from the dining room, there's this crap in the box room, plus around twenty big boxes of books that have nowhere to sit (there are many more boxes in the attic).

Some stuff from the landing bookshelves.

More stuff tucked away upstairs including all of my Saramago, a bunch more classics and some modern Japanese and American fiction.

Yet another bunch of books in a cabinet.

My Japanese textbooks sitting on top of the tallboy in my bedroom.

And there are many, many more volumes scattered around the house.

So, Lynn … psychoanalyse me from that lot.

Books (like guitars) are lifelong friends that have never dumped me.
I kinda like books.