Good news from the University of Nevada, Reno Libraries this week: Donnie Curtis, Head of Special Collections, has announced that Special Collections will not be closing, as recommended in the university's proposed budget cuts announced earlier this year.

Kathlin Ray, Interim Dean of Libraries, said in a statement to the Friends of the Library: "On March 7 the university announced proposed budget cuts of $26 million, and a further $13.8 on April 4 to address a potential budget reduction of $59 million by July 2012 as required by Nevada Governor Sandoval. These cuts are campuswide. While initial recommendations included Special Collections, the library provided an alternative plan to meet the budget reductions. Therefore, Special Collections has been removed from the list of closures, and we are hard at work on a long-term plan to ensure its continuing health and vitality. As we move forward, we welcome your continuing contributions of historically significant Nevada materials and support for fundraising initiatives."

Catalogue Review: Between the Covers, #169

Between the Covers of Gloucester City, New Jersey, is one of the most successful antiquarian booksellers. They have a 15,000-square-foot warehouse of treasures--which I cannot wait to see one day--an absurdly wonderful website, and an extraordinary staff. They also create dynamic, colorful catalogues with the best book images around. I got this spring catalogue just prior to the NYABF three weeks ago.  

Two items jumped out at me right away -- a first edition of Robert Benchley's No Poems or Around the World Backwards and Sideways (1932) that is inscribed by the author, who signed himself "Bobby" ($950). As the catalogue copy noted, "The intimacy of the inscription is telling; we've never before seen Benchley inscribe a book as 'Bobby.'" The other item--on the very same page--is a copy of Henry Beston's The Outermost House inscribed by the author with an eight-page letter to a Mrs. Sweeman enclosed ($5,000). I am a huge fan of Beston's nature writing, and I was thrilled to actually hold this book at the fair in New York and chat with BTC's Dan Gregory about it.

BTC has a particularly strong selection of galleys or proofs. The four Thomas Pynchons they have from the collection of Pynchon's editor Ray Roberts are neat, especially the publisher's dummy of Mason & Dixon ($3,500). It's actually an unprinted text block with a provisional dustwrapper affixed to the pastedowns. There's also a galley proof of Hemingway's Moveable Feast ($4,500) and an uncorrected proof of Brendan Behan's Confessions of an Irish Rebel ($225).

Other surprises that poke out -- the Harvard Class Album of 1932 featuring James Agee ($750), a film corporation stock book associated with producer Harry Aiken ($3,500), and promotional ephemera for Maurice Sendak's I Saw Esau ($350).

But even all this is just the tip of the iceberg at BTC. A new catalogue appeared just days ago -- Archives & Manuscripts, No. 4. All catalogues can be viewed online or in PDF. In print if you request it. You can also visit them at the Bookshop in Old New Castle, in Delaware, where BTC and three other booksellers have partnered in an open shop.

Get some "insight into the collecting mind" with this three-part web documentary, The Curators,  created by the Museum of Online Museums to showcase little known collectors and collections across the country. Below is Part One. Each part is between five and seven minutes, so you can watch everything in about twenty minutes. Enjoy!

The Museum of Online Museums' "The Curators" (Part One) from Coudal Partners on Vimeo.

Sad news today for typewriter devotees -- according to the Atlantic, the last typewriter factory in the world has shut its doors. From the piece:

With only about 200 machines left -- and most of those in Arabic languages -- Godrej and Boyce shut down its plant in Mumbai, India, today. "Although typewriters became obsolete years ago in the west, they were still common in India -- until recently," according to the Daily Mail, which ran a special story this morning about the typewriters demise. "Demand for the machines has sunk in the last ten years as consumers switch to computers." Secretaries, rejoice.

Nick Basbanes' lament about New York City's Writers Room banning typewriters last year has proved more prescient than we would have liked. 

A few prints by Hungarian photographer Brassai went under the hammer last week at Doyle NY (see our photo essay). Two others will be for sale this upcoming weekend at Stair Galleries in Hudson, NY. Their two-day modern and contemporary art auction features an entire day of photography, and a second day devoted to paintings, prints, and other works of art. Here is a brief sampling:

Catalogue Review: Whitmore Rare Books # 2

When I visited the Manhattan Vintage Book & Ephemera Fair two weeks ago (recap here), I met young bookseller Daniel Whitmore of Whitmore Rare Books, Pasadena, CA. I was glad to see his very elegantly produced color catalogue in an age when many booksellers have done away with printed catalogues altogether. It's slim and bright, with great images and clear descriptions.

Lest I be accused of judging a catalogue by its cover, I'll tell you some of the items that caught my eye on the inside. He has several ultra modern first editions, such as Cameron Crowe's Fast Times at Ridgemont High ($200), an inscribed first of The Hunt for Red October ($750), a signed first of Stephen King's Carrie ($2,450), and an inscribed first of The Color Purple ($925). He also has some science fiction from Asimov, Clarke, and Robert A. Heinlein.

Whitmore has a nice mix of books--a literary generalist, so to speak--and I found myself pleasantly surprised by the intermingling of signed Cormac McCarthys with first editions of Mark Twain and Samuel Butler. He has several titles that were later made into films, a first edition of Gone With the Wind ($2,750) prominent among them.

It seems that every bookseller in California has at least some Bukowski on hand, and Whitmore is no exception. Except that he has something very a la mode. Bukowski's "Fax Poem" -- a poem sent by Buk to John Martin, publisher of Black Sparrow Press, in 1994, just before Bukowski's death. It is one of ten copies that Martin made, numbered and initialed; this is #4/10. It is listed at $950.

If his catalogue is any indication, we'll be seeing much more of Daniel Whitmore in the future. Download his first two catalogues here.

Doyle New York's Books, Photographs and Prints sale was held yesterday, in 506 lots. The big seller, and a surprise one, was a manuscript music album compiled by Arnold Wehner, Director of Music at the University of Gottingen (1846-1855). Presale estimates pegged it at $8,000-12,000, but it was hammered down for $158,500!

Several top-notch items from the library of Ezra Pound's son Omar Shakespear Pound also did very well: a copy of A Draft of the Cantos 17-27 (London: John Rodker, 1928) printed on vellum and accompanied by a collection of proof sheets sold for $59,375, while a copy of A Draft of XVI Cantos (Paris, 1925) inscribed by Pound to his son made $27,500 and a signed copy of A Lume Spento (Venice, 1908) fetched $28,125.

Full results available here.

Back in 2008, I wrote a short article for FB&C on the stellar season of award-winning films that were based on books (it was the year of Atonement, No Country for Old Men, Into the Wild, and others). I asked antiquarian booksellers whether a good film adaptation had any effect on book sales. The consensus seemed to be that only if the film was great would book sales surge. Harvey Jason of Mystery Pier Books in West Hollywood told me at the time that all the movie hype "does help because it brings the title to prominence." But, he added, "it has to be a literary high spot to begin with."

As many of you know, Ayn Rand's conservative classic, Atlas Shrugged, was released into theaters last Friday (Tax Day!). So I was intrigued to see this write-up in Forbes about how the film has already spurred Atlas to the Amazon bestseller list (it is #21 today). In the article, Mark E. Babej writes, "all signs point to the fact that the mere existence of the movie is causing interest in the book to spike to new heights."

Curious about the film? Here's the trailer:

Taking a stab at the empty cultural space for serious book reviews these days, The Los Angeles Review of Books (a digital magazine) debuted--or at least posted a preview of itself--yesterday with a thoughtful and worthwhile (if somewhat ironic) essay on "The Death of the Book" by Ben Ehrenreich. It begins:

Pity the book.  It's dead again.  Last I checked, Googling "death of the book" produced 11.8 million matches.  The day before it was 11.6 milion.  It's getting unseemly.  Books were once such handsome things.  Suddenly they seem clunky,  heavy, almost fleshy in their gross materiality.  Their pages grow brittle.  Their ink fades.  Their spines collapse.  They are so pitiful, they might as well be human. [....More]