It seems returning war booty is a trend. The New York Times ran an article yesterday about a two-volume Bible that vanished from a library in Vienna during Kristallnacht. The sixteenth-century book is now on its way home, 71 years later.
In this month's Fine Books, writer Chris Lancette reports the story of World War II veteran Robert Thomas, who returned two sixteenth-century books to Germany last month. He took the volumes from a salt mine during his tour with Patton's Third Army.
The Washington Post also covered the story and provided a one-minute video clip of Thomas talking about his decision.
(Video by Michael Ruane/Edited by Ernesto Bailey/The Washington Post)
The Washington Post also covered the story and provided a one-minute video clip of Thomas talking about his decision.
(Video by Michael Ruane/Edited by Ernesto Bailey/The Washington Post)
Indulge me, please, as I make a connection between the recent victory in the World Series of the New York Yankees--their 27th championship--and what so many futurists perceive to be the imminence of a paperless society, and what, by extension, all that portends for the traditional book as we know it. It's a stretch, I agree, but an amusing concept to consider all the same.
If you were paying attention this past Friday, there was a ticker-tape parade through Lower Manhattan, and unlike so many other New Englanders who chose to tune out--I have been a Red Sox fan for more than half-a-century--I tuned in. Yes, I wanted to see the MVP, Hideki Matsui, riding in the lead float, I even wanted to see that amiable turncoat, Johnny Damon (I am actually very fond of the man), rejoicing in the triumph with his ebullient teammates. But what I wanted to see most of all was how New York City was going to handle the matter of the ticker tape at a time when there is no ticker tape.
The reason for that, you see, is quite simply that there are no more stock tickers, there haven't been any for about thirty years or so, the only ones that survive are now museum pieces, and the only ticker tape available these days is a custom-order curiosity that sells online for $40 a spool. But there was a parade in Lower Manhattan through the Canyon of Heroes on Friday, all right--the 205th such celebration since the whole tradition got started on October, 29, 1886, that one to salute the newly dedicated Statue of Liberty--and there was plenty of paper filling the air. What it was, according to press accounts, was a half-ton of confetti packed in 400 bags and trucked in by a group known as the Downtown Alliance to be distributed among employees in the financial district who now get their stock quotations from computers.
When the confetti ran out, according to a piece in the New York Post, some dull-witted revelers began tossing rolls of toilet paper, which is fine enough, I suppose, as long as its unspooled and not likely to cause a concussion if it hits someone on the street, but not so bright were the financial records and other confidential office materials that went out the windows along with it. Among the fifty tons of debris collected by sanitation workers were pay stubs and trust fund balance sheets. Some of the documents came from the Liberty Street financial firm A.L. Sarroff, including client accounts, with Social Security numbers and detailed banking data. "They're records that should have been shredded," said firm founder Alan Sarroff. "An overzealous employee threw them out the window. He was reprimanded."
So--a half-ton of confetti, and fifty tons of office paper, a ticker tape parade doth make. There's still plenty of cellulose, in other words, to fill the void, and a good deal of it, apparently, remains necessary to the conducting of business. And the future of the parade itself? Like the traditional book that so many of us prefer, it's in no immediate jeopardy of falling out of favor either. Why? Simple enough, in both instances, because people like it. All you need to mount a procession through in the city that never sleeps is a legitimate hero to honor. Good luck on that score; if you're going to toss out the office records in jubilation, though, make sure you shred them first.
If you were paying attention this past Friday, there was a ticker-tape parade through Lower Manhattan, and unlike so many other New Englanders who chose to tune out--I have been a Red Sox fan for more than half-a-century--I tuned in. Yes, I wanted to see the MVP, Hideki Matsui, riding in the lead float, I even wanted to see that amiable turncoat, Johnny Damon (I am actually very fond of the man), rejoicing in the triumph with his ebullient teammates. But what I wanted to see most of all was how New York City was going to handle the matter of the ticker tape at a time when there is no ticker tape.
The reason for that, you see, is quite simply that there are no more stock tickers, there haven't been any for about thirty years or so, the only ones that survive are now museum pieces, and the only ticker tape available these days is a custom-order curiosity that sells online for $40 a spool. But there was a parade in Lower Manhattan through the Canyon of Heroes on Friday, all right--the 205th such celebration since the whole tradition got started on October, 29, 1886, that one to salute the newly dedicated Statue of Liberty--and there was plenty of paper filling the air. What it was, according to press accounts, was a half-ton of confetti packed in 400 bags and trucked in by a group known as the Downtown Alliance to be distributed among employees in the financial district who now get their stock quotations from computers.
When the confetti ran out, according to a piece in the New York Post, some dull-witted revelers began tossing rolls of toilet paper, which is fine enough, I suppose, as long as its unspooled and not likely to cause a concussion if it hits someone on the street, but not so bright were the financial records and other confidential office materials that went out the windows along with it. Among the fifty tons of debris collected by sanitation workers were pay stubs and trust fund balance sheets. Some of the documents came from the Liberty Street financial firm A.L. Sarroff, including client accounts, with Social Security numbers and detailed banking data. "They're records that should have been shredded," said firm founder Alan Sarroff. "An overzealous employee threw them out the window. He was reprimanded."
So--a half-ton of confetti, and fifty tons of office paper, a ticker tape parade doth make. There's still plenty of cellulose, in other words, to fill the void, and a good deal of it, apparently, remains necessary to the conducting of business. And the future of the parade itself? Like the traditional book that so many of us prefer, it's in no immediate jeopardy of falling out of favor either. Why? Simple enough, in both instances, because people like it. All you need to mount a procession through in the city that never sleeps is a legitimate hero to honor. Good luck on that score; if you're going to toss out the office records in jubilation, though, make sure you shred them first.
Have you seen the newest Levi's commercials yet? They've used Walt Whitman's poem "Pioneers! O Pioneers!." You can see the ads here and here.
Seattle, one of America's Most Literate Cities has been hard hit on the literary front of late. Yes, the home of Amazon.com, Sherman Alexie, and once home to Thomas Pynchon (he worked at Boeing for awhile), is not doing well very much at all.
First off, the Seattle Public Library system. Due to budget falls, SPL has plans to cut hours, in a big way. The Seattle Times has more to the story, but here it is in a nutshell:
Since 2000, according to the library, library usage has roared from 4.5 million in-person and virtual visitors to 13.2 million. So, to respond to this need? The library budgetary cut backs by way of a 23% reduction in library hours. Ouch.
Secondly, the Elliott Bay Book Company, touted nationwide as one of the top independent bookstores in the United States is having difficulties. Financial troubles again are cited but the owner is considering moving away from Pioneer Square (a tourist Mecca in the Emerald City) or closing it entirely. This is a store that has readings by folks like Tim O'Brien, Peter Matthiessen, Jim Harrison, and oodles more of the world's best authors. Seattle will simply no longer be "America's Most Literate City" without it.
And now, gay-friendly Bailey/Coy Books is closing. A stories independent bookshop in Seattle's trendy Capitol Hill neighborhood is cleaning out its bookshelves. It opened in 1982. It's closing the end of November. The Seattle Times, again, has the sad tale.
Seattle, America's Most Literate City, not so much anymore.
First off, the Seattle Public Library system. Due to budget falls, SPL has plans to cut hours, in a big way. The Seattle Times has more to the story, but here it is in a nutshell:
Since 2000, according to the library, library usage has roared from 4.5 million in-person and virtual visitors to 13.2 million. So, to respond to this need? The library budgetary cut backs by way of a 23% reduction in library hours. Ouch.
Secondly, the Elliott Bay Book Company, touted nationwide as one of the top independent bookstores in the United States is having difficulties. Financial troubles again are cited but the owner is considering moving away from Pioneer Square (a tourist Mecca in the Emerald City) or closing it entirely. This is a store that has readings by folks like Tim O'Brien, Peter Matthiessen, Jim Harrison, and oodles more of the world's best authors. Seattle will simply no longer be "America's Most Literate City" without it.
And now, gay-friendly Bailey/Coy Books is closing. A stories independent bookshop in Seattle's trendy Capitol Hill neighborhood is cleaning out its bookshelves. It opened in 1982. It's closing the end of November. The Seattle Times, again, has the sad tale.
Seattle, America's Most Literate City, not so much anymore.
The papers of two major American writers have found homes in
the past month. In October, the Houghton Library at Harvard announced that it
had acquired the John Updike archive, described as "a vast collection of
manuscripts, correspondence, books, photographs, artwork and other papers." A
small portion of Updike's papers had been given to the university in 1970, and
for decades Updike kept up his close association with the Harvard library,
depositing manuscripts, files, even golf scorecards. According to the library's
press release, cataloging the new material is now one of the library's "highest
priorities." Updike died in January of this year.
Today the New York Public Library announced that it also
acquired the papers of one of the twentieth century's most esteemed authors: E.
Annie Proulx. According to the press release, the collection "spans much of
Proulx's life, from her university days through her journalism career and to
the present. It includes 4,200 pages of short stories, essays, poems and
screenplays; 145 pages of preparatory notes and research and three original
notebooks with holograph draft ideas; more than 1,060 pages of holograph diary;
more than 10,200 pages of typescript, much of it with holograph revisions and
corrections, 2,100 galley proofs, and 1,855 pages of other related materials.
Correspondence, including email totals more than 4,500 pages." To which I can
only reply, wow, she printed her emails? Good news for literary and book history
scholars. The collection becomes part of the incredible Henry W. and Albert A.
Berg Collection of English and American Literature at NYPL.
Flora Mirabilis How Plants Have Shaped World Knowledge, Health, Wealth and Beauty, by Cahterine Herbert Howell (National Geographic Books, 256 pages, $35.) Yes, this is a title that will certainly interest gardeners, but of far greater import is the appeal it undoubtedly will have to collectors of botanical books, and people who are interested in various special collections devoted to the genre in general. How plants have figured in history is the essential theme--rice, maize, flax, wheat, cotton, opium poppy, pepper, coffee, grape, potato, passionflower, date, olive, bamboo --use your imagination, the likelihood is that it's here. But making this presentation a special bouquet of wonders for bibliophiles is the 200 illustrations, all of them reproduced from a remarkable rare book collection maintained by the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis, established in 1859, and the beneficiary in 1893 of an outstanding library of pre-Linnaean works on medical botany, agriculture, and edible or otherwise useful plants gathered by Edward Sturtevant, a major collector. The earliest work represented in the volume is the Gart der Gesundheit (Garden of Health), a compendium of medicinal botany printed in Germany in 1487. The text is arranged in ten chapters, and follows an arc of botanical exploration and trade throughout the world. Quite a nice book, and ideal as a gift. My forthcoming piece for this month in Fine Books & Collections, incidentally, will showcase my top choices for holiday giving.And while we're at it:
Defend the Realm: The Authorized History of MI5, by Christopher Andrew; Alfred A. Knopf, 1,032 pages, $40.
This is my kind of book--big, fat, packed with fascinating detail on an irresistible subject, in this instance the 100-year history of the British Security Service, better known as MI5, which opened its archives to the scrutiny of an independent historian. I won't pretend I've read the whole thing yet--it just came in a couple days ago--but what I have dipped into so far, I have devoured.
Christeopher Andrew, a professor of modern and contemporary history at Cambridge University, is the author of 14 previous books, including two volumes of The Mitrokhin Archive. "The Service," he writes in the preface here, "like the rest of the intelligence community, was to stay as far from public view as possible." This little bit of sunshine should open a lot of eyes.
