November 2009

We’re always happy to hear from Fine Books readers.

I would like to make a correction to your coverage of the Grolier’s “Books in Hard Times” conference. I did NOT say my major concern was the graying trade and client base. Rather, I said just the OPPOSITE. I noted it was a concern that has been expressed with some regularity on listserves of the trade, but my experience had always shown the client and trade base as an older demographic. The fourth concern I noted “in the ether,” (economy, graying trade, graying customer, being #’s 1, 2, and 3) was the digitalization of books. I noted that I didn’t see that as a problem for book arts as people have always wanted to patronize the arts, desiring actual objects. I concluded we are not in another Great Depression and we would get through this, advising to keep an eye out for new trends in collecting.

Please publish this letter.

Thank you.

Priscilla Juvelis, Inc.
11 Goose Fair
Kennebunkport, ME  04046
www.juvelisbooks.com
Member: Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America
International League of Antiquarian Booksellers

I was very happy to be able to purchase and hold and dog ear the latest hard copy Fine Books and Collections Compendium 2010. Wonderful! You were sorely missed.

One suggestion: Please bring back the “How I got started” section of your publication. That one page interview/appreciation of an individual collector and his/her focus provided a dimension that no other content within your publication seems to provide. It is hard to quantify. Perhaps I saw the soul of Books, capital “B,” through those individual collector’s eyes.

Good tidings,
John Kurtz
Private Library Holdings