Yes, the torrent of books and articles about Charles Dickens just keeps on going. Today, we learn that Dickens had a lifelong obsession with home decoration thanks to this great piece in The Guardian.
He wrote an article called “Household Scenery”, for a journal called Household Words and penned 6,000 words on wall coverings from tapestries to wallpapers to tackling rising damp.
I love the idea of Dickens – the man who wrote about orphans and workhouses – doing a reno in old London town. He’d take a bleak house in some east London slum, do it up and then flip it at a huge profit.
It’s been two years since the mystery visitor to Edgar Allan Poe’s grave failed to show up for the first year. January 19th 2012 marked Poe’s would-be 203rd birthday, and the third year in a row that the traditional visitor – a figure in a black and white scarf and wide-brimmed hat who left three roeses and a half-full bottle of cognac on Poe’s grave every year – did not make an appearance.
Fans waited hopefully, but while two impersonators showed, the real figure did not. No word as to whether the figure decided Poe’s 200th birthday was a fitting final tribute, or died, or moved away. Not even any word on whether it was only one person, or a passed torch, but the visitor had been a faithful guest since the 1940s. Disappointed fans had stated that they would show up this year for the final time, and if nobody came, let the tradition go. But the visitor and associated mystery will no doubt be much missed.
I’m a cricket fan and surf the cricket stories each day (while at work but don’t tell anyone). This morning I noticed a remarkable book-related snippet in a cricketing feature as England took on Pakistan in the latest Test match in Dubai.
It concerns an awful incident in 2009 in Pakistan when terrorists ambushed buses carrying the Sri Lanka cricket team and the umpires for a match against Pakistan.
Ahsan Raza was one of the umpires and he was badly wounded as the buses were strafed with bullets from machine guns.
“I was hit by two bullets, one in my lung,” Raza said. “I was saved by two things. One, I put an ICC (handbook, with all the rules and regulations), in front of my stomach.” But one of the bullets still penetrated, as he shows by lifting his shirt to reveal a lengthy scar down his front.
A fellow match official, Chris Broad (a very nice man whom I met once), helped stop the bleeding from the wound.
ICC stands for International Cricket Council and its a body that’s heavy on administration. I believe the handbook is around 471 pages thick. Cricket has a lot of rules – far more than a simple game like baseball – and thank goodness for that. I’ve heard of books tucked into breast pockets saving soldiers’ lives in battles but never in the cricketing field.
When it’s dark, and the last customer has left… the proprietor’s gone home, the lights are out and the door is locked…the books can shed the silly pretense of being inanimate objects, shake off the constraints of the day-to-day shelf, and get on with the joyous, celebratory business of being a book.
Dave Eggers, author of the most excellent Zeitoun and founder of McSweeney’s, is publishing a short story on a shower curtain. No, it’s not a reworking of Psycho by Robert Bloch. The ‘publisher’ is The Thing, a quarterly that issues objects that are art-related or literary. The story curtain costs $65 – it better be good. Story and image via Jacket Copy.
This news opens up many literary possibilities especially for all the people who say the physical book is dead. Short stories could be published on towels, bed sheets, duvet covers, rugs, and table clothes.
Here at AbeBooks Headquarters, we occasionally step away from our bubbling beakers to read books. And we’ve all noticed a disturbing trend throughout classic literature.
Many of the so-called “classics” are entirely devoid of cats. I know.
Cats and books go together like bees and honey. So we took it upon ourselves to properly “Catify” some of the classics. We bring you, the joy of Kitty Lit. Cats on classic covers!
We’ve gotten a great start with The Great Catsby, A Tale of Two Kitties, Lord of the Fleas and more. And our talented group of Design wizards worked their magic to create newer, cat-centric classic covers as well, to lend some gorgeous visuals to our catification. Enjoy, share with your friends, and if you have an idea for another cat-centric book title, please leave it in the comments!
…and just in time for Santa Claws!
…sorry. I hope that doesn’t cause any hissy-fits. Ooh, there’s another. Sorry. Don’t get furryous. Whoops. Don’t worry, I’m at the tail end of this post…
Over at Etsy – the marketplace for handmade goods – there is a selection of literary dolls for sale. Yes, you can buy a Sylvia Plath doll or Mark Twain or Joyce Carol Oates.
One of the best parts of my job is the frequent stumbling upon of weird and fantastic things. My discovery for today? The monograph Salami by Swiss photographer Hans Gissinger and writer/big eater Gerard Oberle.
Published in 2001 by Woodstock Press, the print run for Salami was limited to 500 copies, each numbered and signed by Gissinger.
With 60 (arguably) beautiful photographic portraits of various salamis, with accompanying essays, I can only imagine this book would be a unique and memorable gift for anyone who loves meat and art. In fact, I wonder whether my colleague Richard, who delights in making his own sausage, would fancy a copy on his coffee table (vegetarian colleague Julie, however, blanched at the photos).
Oscar Wilde’s restored tomb has been unveiled along with its “kiss-proof” glass barrier, reports the BBC. Located in Paris, renovation work was required on the gravestone because it was simply being kissed way by literary tourists.
Wilde died of cerebral meningitis on 30 November 1900. He was initially buried in the Cimetière de Bagneux but in 1909 his remains were moved to Père Lachaise Cemetery. The tomb was designed by Sir Jacob Epstein and features a modernist angel, which “lost” its male genitalia to vandals.
Beginning in April 1926, Amazing Stories ran for almost 80 years. The first magazine dedicated purely to science fiction, it was much beloved, despite an occasionally spotty publication schedule.
Some issues are particularly noteworthy, like Volume 3, Issue #5 from 1928, which features the first print appearance of Buck Rogers. But from rocketships and robots to telepathy and time travel, Amazing Stories provided entertainment, adventure and intrigue in every issue, and many are very collectible today.
Britain’s Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) is reviving this Victorian dish of two slices of bread around a slice of toast. The BBC has the story.
The food writer Mrs Beeton popularized this somewhat bland meal in the days before Coco Pops, Pop Tarts and Angel Delight. Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management celebrates its 150th birthday in December, so it’s time to revisit some of these old but tasty recipes.
The RSC’s Dr John Emsley said: “You simply put a piece of dry toast between two slices of bread and butter, with salt and pepper to taste. I’ve tried it and it’s surprisingly nice to eat and quite filling.
“I would emphasise that toast sandwiches are also good at saving you calories as well as money, provided you only have one toast sandwich for lunch and nothing else.”
Speak of toast (which I had for breakfast this morning), last night I began reading Toast by Nigel Slater. It’s already a deeply touching memoir and so simply written. Food affects everything, especially through the eyes of a child. I’ll write more once I finished the book.
It’s a book…. no, it’s a sewing kit. No, it’s a sewing kit disguised as a book. Phillip J. Pirages Rare Books in McMinnville, Oregon, has this unusual item for sale on AbeBooks and it might appeal to needleworkers and crafters.
It’s from around 1840 and an ideal accessory for the Victorian lady traveller. The kit slides out of its slipcase and unfolds to reveal four pockets containing different sizes of small needles. There are also three slots for threads (black, brown and beige) and sections that hold five sewing tools – a pair of scissors, a folding penknife in a mother of pearl case, a pearl-handled stiletto, and two bodkins, one for lace and one for ribbons.
This is indeed a gem and it is titled as “The Gem” on the spine. Its price is $3,132.
And in today’s episode of “When Unlikely Celebrities Collide”, Salman Rushdie tweeted his opinions on Kim Kardashian’s failed marriage. Weird? It gets weirder. He did it in limerick form:
The marriage of poor Kim Kardashian
Was krushed like a kar in a krashian
Her kris kried “Not fair!
why kan’t I keep my share?”
But Kardashian fell klean out of fashian.
Tune in tomorrow, when Joan Didion will share her latest haikus about Jersey Shore with us.
Someone at Exeter Cathedral must be purple-faced, cringing and hiding.
The Anglican cathedral in Devon recently installed engravings of poetry quotations in the pavements around the cathedral, ostensibly to inspire, stimulate thought and provoke imagination.
Instead, one of the engravings in particular has provoked incredulity, anger and embarrassment. The quotation in question – “The world is charged with the grandeur of God” – was mistakenly attributed to Gerald Manley Hopkins, instead of to its correct author – 19th-century English poet Gerard Manley Hopkins. It’s moments like these I’m profoundly grateful that I work with a keyboard and not a chisel.
It’s been two years since 
Anyone ever eaten a toast sandwich?
