#history of books

[kaylas-words]

"...its adherents can recognize one another by the glint in their eyes."

Boom. That's it. There's the writing prompt.

But if you're curious, it's from Robert Darnton's “What is the History of Books?” from The Kiss of Lamourette: Reflections in Cultural History p. 108:

The history of books began to acquire its own journals, research centers, conferences, and lecture circuits. It accumulated tribal elders as well as Young Turks. And although it has not yet developed passwords or secret handshakes or its own population of Ph.D.'s, its adherents can recognize one another by the glint in their eyes. They belong to a common cause, one of the few sectors in the human sciences where there is a mood of expansion and a flurry of fresh ideas.

On that note, it's pretty cool to look through 500-year-old rare books with a forensic eye.

Actually, it's very cool.

Just look at it! Who wouldn't want to flip through a book like that?

I might stage a heist if it weren't for medieval book curses. Artwork:

"Baldurs Gate 3 Gale Fan Art" by Gerry Arthur

"Daily Practice#097" by Kittichai Rueangchaichan (Razaras)

"Sirius" by Anna Helme

"Owain" by Marta Nael

Pictures by me

[mask131]

Since I have been sharing several videos lately, I wanted to post here a video I absolutely love because it tackles something I really feel when it comes to the covers of horror books - and in general a certain art of book covers:

[houseofyork-info]

Another deep dive into the history of text technology! I admit the title is terrible, I seriously could not think of a better one, woe

[mask131]

Remember when books were this big?

Why don't we see more huge books in today's fiction? There were still some in cartoons and video-games when I was a kid, but today it seems nobody dares to make chunky books anymore.

From The Archives Of Prague Castle.

Found here (via Kybl).

[spyboy2000]

ᴇᴢʀᴀ ᴊᴀᴄᴋ ᴋᴇᴀᴛs Artwork from his 1962 book The Snowy Day.

[that-butch-archivist]

"Lesbian Weddings" by Wendy Jill York

source: The Femme Mystique, edited by Lesléa Newman

[i-dont-trust-butterflies]

Please, don't stress about it so much

One day we'll all forget about it, remember?

[mask131]

My gosh YES bring back the portable book-cases! I need this in my life

In the Middle Ages, it was very common to wear a book case on the belt. Book of Hours, Bible, Breviary etc and they were thus at your fingertips.

This one is Italian, made between 1465 and 1485, in nicely worked leather.

[inkskinned]

this is just my opinion but i think any good media needs obsession behind it. it needs passion, the kind of passion that's no longer "gentle scented candle" and is now "oh shit the house caught on fire". it needs a creator that's biting the floorboards and gnawing the story off their skin. creators are supposed to be wild animals. they are supposed to want to tell a story with the ferocity of eating a good stone fruit while standing over the sink. the same protective, strange instinct as being 7 and making mud potions in pink teacups: you gotta get weird with it.

good media needs unhinged, googling-at-midnight kind of energy. it needs "what kind of seams are invented on this planet" energy and "im just gonna trust the audience to roll with me about this" energy. it needs one person (at least) screaming into the void with so much drive and energy that it forces the story to be real.

sometimes people are baffled when fanfic has some stunning jaw-dropping tattoo-it-on-you lines. and i'm like - well, i don't go here, but that makes sense to me. of fucking course people who have this amount of passion are going to create something good. they moved from a place of genuine love and enjoyment.

so yeah, duh! saturday cartoons have banger lines. random street art is sometimes the most precious heart-wrenching shit you've ever seen. someone singing on tiktok ends up creating your next favorite song. youtubers are giving us 5 hours of carefully researched content. all of this is the impossible equation to latestage capitalism. like, you can't force something to be good. AI cannot make it good. no amount of focus-group testing or market research. what makes a story worth listening to is that someone cares so much about telling it - through dance, art, music, whatever it takes - that they are just a little unhinged about it.

one time my friend told me he stayed up all night researching how many ways there are to peel an orange. he wrote me a poem that made me cry on public transportation. the love came through it like pith, you know? the words all came apart in my hands. it tasted like breakfast.

[cryptocism]

"just as I did, in 1983."

you'd never know my favourite parts of the show are the fucked up insane bits when my first instinct is to draw the cheesiest thing imaginable

[unleashed-imagination]

I notice that Autumn is more the season of the soul than of nature.

— Friedrich Nietzsche

[landsccape]

[acrosscenturiesandgenerations]

▪︎ Album of seaweed specimens, in scallop shell binding.

Place of origin: Great Britain

Date: mid-19th century

[epestrefe]

Πώς διασχίζουν οι λέξεις τον χώρο και τον χρόνο; Ένα συναρπαστικό ταξίδι στη ζωή του βιβλίου

Μια περιπλάνηση με στάσεις στα πεδία των μαχών του Αλέξανδρου και στη Βίλα των Παπύρων, στα ανάκτορα της Κλεοπάτρας και στον τόπο δολοφονίας της Υπατίας, στις βιβλιοθήκες και στα εργαστήρια αντιγραφής χειρογράφων, στις πυρές όπου κάηκαν απαγορευμένοι κώδικες και στα γκουλάγκ, στη βιβλιοθήκη του Σαράγεβο και στον υπόγειο λαβύρινθο της Οξφόρδης το έτος 2000. Ένα νήμα που ενώνει τους κλασικούς με τον σύγχρονο κόσμο…

Μια συλλογική περιπέτεια με ήρωες χιλιάδες πρόσωπα, τα οποία συνέβαλαν στη δημιουργία και την προστασία των βιβλίων: αφηγήτριες, γραφείς, εικονογράφοι, μεταφραστές, πλανόδιοι πωλητές, δασκάλες, λόγιοι, κατάσκοποι, εξεγερμένοι, μοναχές, σκλάβοι, τυχοδιώκτριες… αναγνώστες σε κορυφές βουνών και δίπλα στη θάλασσα, στις πρωτεύουσες που σφύζουν από ζωή και σε απομακρυσμένους θύλακες όπου βρίσκει καταφύγιο η γνώση σε χαοτικούς καιρούς. Οι απλοί άνθρωποι, τα ονόματα των οποίων δεν καταγράφει η Ιστορία, είναι οι πρωταγωνιστές αυτού του βιβλίου.

ΚΡΑΤΙΚΟ ΒΡΑΒΕΙΟ ΔΟΚΙΜΙΟΥ 2020 (ΙΣΠΑΝΙΑ)

Πηγή:https://akybernitespoliteies.org/shop/dokimio/papyros-i-peripeteia-tou-vivliou-apo-tin-archaiotita-mechri-simera