Theodor Geisel, a.k.a. Dr. Seuss, wore many hats in his time -- as advertising copywriter, Army filmmaker, book editor, children's author and illustrator -- none so colorful as this straw number, one of several hundred in his private collection of chapeaux. According to the New York Times, he kept them hidden in a bookcase in his California home. Twenty-six of the hats are now seeing the light of day in a national touring exhibition, Hats Off to Dr. Seuss.

The exhibit is timed to coincide with the seventy-fifth anniversary (and the new anniversary edition) of Seuss' The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. It opened on Monday at the New York Public Library's Children Center on 42nd Street and will move on to the Animazing Gallery in New York City, from February 13-17. From there, the exhibit travels to fifteen other locations around the country.

The striking thing about the hats is that some are recognizable from his illustrations and paintings. The red Robin Hood cap, for example, appears atop Bartholomew Cubbins' head. And, of course, there's the Cat in the Hat's red-striped stovepipe--Seuss owned one of those, too.

Photo courtesy of drseussart.com. 

As you may have heard by now, Faber has published a new edition of The Bell Jar to commemorate the semi-autobiographical novel's 50th anniversary.  The cover has ignited a lot of controversy:

Criticism over the new cover centers on the perception that it is marketing The Bell Jar as "chick-lit," and not treating it as serious literature.  The London Review of Books summed up the controversy:

"It should be possible to see 'The Bell Jar' as a deadpan younger cousin of Walker Percy's 'The Moviegoer,' or even William Burroughs's 'Naked Lunch.' But that's not the way Faber are marketing it. The anniversary edition fits into the depressing trend for treating fiction by women as a genre, which no man could be expected to read and which women will only know is meant for them if they can see a woman on the cover."

It's a far cry from the original first edition cover, seen here: (Victoria Lucas, by the way, was Sylvia Plath's pen name).


But it's not such a far cry from some of the other covers issued by Faber over the years, such as this one:

The amusing bit about this controversy is that it has sparked a whole slew of parody covers.  Some of my favorites are below:


(this cover by johnhornor)

(this cover by Cethan Leahy)

(this cover by steamed hams)

So, what do you think of the new cover for The Bell Jar?  Is it worthy of the controversy it has sparked? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

An auction of vintage posters at Swann Galleries tomorrow will include this well known and much appreciated poster, "Books Are Weapons in the War of Ideas." This vivid depiction of Nazis burning books was printed by the U.S. Government Printing Office in 1942. The estimate is $400-600; could be a great buy for collectors of the books made and distributed for propaganda purposes during World War II, as discussed in John B. Hench's superb book on the subject, Books As Weapons.

This weekend heralds the grand opening of the London Centre for Book Arts, the UK's first dedicated open-access educational book arts center. Akin to New York's Center for Book Arts, which was founded in 1974 by Richard Minsky (also our Book Arts columnist), the LCBA is offering classes and workshops in papermaking, letterpress printing, and bookbinding.

The decision to open the LCBA occurred to recent London College of Communication graduate Simon Goode during a three-month trip to the U.S. He was inspired by visiting several book arts institutions in the states and then struck by the fact that no such place existed in London. "I soon found out there was nowhere for me to use all these bits of specialised equipment that I'd learned. I spent three years learning all these bookbinding and printmaking techniques, it was amazing and I had a brilliant time and I wanted to carry on, but there was simply no access," he told The Guardian last month.

Goode has equipped the new space in Fish Island, Hackney, with a Victorian guillotine once owned by poet Ted Hughes and an 1897 wooden press. A schedule of classes is up on the LCBA's Facebook page.

Image via LCBA.