Fittingly, a new exhibition on witchcraft opens today at Cornell University. Pulled from the university's Witchcraft Collection, The World Bewitch'd spans five hundred years of witch-related material: trial documents, religious texts, spells, and even confessions explore a group of people, often women, marginalized and ostracized from society, with the core of the material hailing from Germany and France. The highlight of the show includes the first book on witchcraft ever printed, as well as handwritten transcripts from European witchcraft trials. Throughout history, witches were often portrayed as either ugly old hags or as alluring seductresses, and the show explores how that view has changed--or not--with the passage of time. 

                                                                                                                                                                     

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                                                                                                                                                              "This collection has profound repercussions on today's world, where persecution of the defenseless is alive and well," said exhibition co-curator Anne Kenney. The collection was once part of the personal archives of Cornell co-founder Andrew Dickson White and is believed to be one of the largest collections on witchcraft in North America.

                                                                                                                                                    The opening reception is today from 4:00-5:30 at the Kroch Library on level 2B. The World Bewitch'd will remain on display through August 31, 2018.

                                                                                                                                                           Image: "The Witches," by Hans Baldung (1510). Woodcut. Public Domain, courtsey of the Met Museum.

Guest post by Mark. S. Weiner, co-curator of the current Grolier Club exhibition, Law's Picture Books: The Yale Law Library Collection.

                                                                                                                                                                                               Museums, libraries, and other cultural institutions today are making sophisticated use of video as a tool for public education. But how should those institutions use film when their subject is books? The answer isn't obvious.

As a scholar and filmmaker, I recently had the pleasure of collaborating on a well-received exhibition for the Grolier Club with Mike Widener, the rare book librarian at Yale Law Library. Four years in the making, the exhibit was titled Law's Picture Books: The Yale Law Library Collection (September 13-November 18, 2017), and it examined Yale's unique collection of illustrated law books, which includes over fifteen hundred items, spanning eight centuries and six continents.

As a rare book librarian, Mike has robust public outreach goals. With that in mind, he and I decided that we would supplement our exhibit with a suite of films displayed on a kiosk in the exhibition gallery, as well as available online. Our conviction was that we could use the special aesthetic resources of film to highlight qualities about books that would be far more difficult to reveal through the text of exhibition labels alone.

Law 1.png"Law's Picture Books" in the Grolier Club Exhibition Gallery, video kiosk indicated.

And therein lay a challenge!

On the face of it, books are about the least cinematic subject imaginable. For one thing, they don't move--and the ability to depict motion over time lies at the heart of film as a medium. They also don't emit much sound. It's no surprise that in Hollywood, books are often important props. But how can they be the stars?

Our collaboration revealed some principles. They won't be applicable to everyone, but they've come to be guiding principles for the production company that's grown from our work together, Hidden Cabinet Films, which is dedicated especially to making films about books for the growing field of public humanities.

Law 2.png                           Depict books in their materiality, but with ideas in mind.

Books have a physical presence in human life. They are three-dimensional objects calling out to be touched and handled. Films about books should use the essential elements of cinematography to highlight these tactile qualities.

The use of shallow depth of field in still shots, for instance, can underscore how books reside in space. Likewise, close-ups and macrophotography can highlight a book's details and imperfections--stressing the uniqueness of each volume--and they can point to its history of human use by showcasing scuffing and marginalia.

Law 3.pngThe use of a shallow depth of field renders the foreground subtly out of focus. From "A Philosophical Question"

Law 4.png                                           From "A Philosophical Question"

Yet films shouldn't aestheticize books without cause. The depiction of physicality should be in the service of some argument about the book's meaning or importance. In the case of law's picture books, Mike and I sought to stress that the books we put on display were practical tools used by lawyers in the resolution of human conflicts. They possess a worldly particularity that stands in stark contrast to the abstraction of legal rules.

Films about books should be driven by ideas.

Set books in motion.

Law 5.png        A shot that opens with a satisfying crackle. From "A Philosophical Question."

When possible, films about books should show books being opened and their pages turned. Doing so underscores another aspect of a book's physicality, and it also indicates that books exist in time--and thus have a history.

One way to suggest that a book's motion is motivated by an idea--and to give books an immediacy of presence--is to film them against a green screen for later compositing. The shot needs to be in close up, and it requires careful lighting, especially with older books whose fore edges are rough.

When capturing images of books in motion, films also should capture their sound. The sound a book makes may be subtle, but it's essential to how human beings experience it. Failing to capture a book's sound represents a major missed opportunity to use film's special power as a medium.

Capture interiority.

At the same time, the absence of sound where expected can be used to suggest the kind of interior experience of aesthetic absorption that's at the heart of reading.

Law 6.pngAn extended shot of a book dealer shaking his head as he flips through a book's pages, set only to music. From "Love & Surprise."

Show that books represent something larger than individual human beings.

Even something as small as a telling camera angle in a consciously composed shot can suggest how book collecting involves collectors in a field much bigger than themselves. Films about books should evoke reverence for the publishing tradition.

Law 7.png                                              From "Two Ways to Work"

Depict human relationships.

People not only interact with books, they interact with each other through books. Films about books should capture the various ways in which books form a third term in a relationship between two or more people.

Law 8.png                                                From "Love & Surprise"

Law 9.png                                                 From "Love & Surprise"

Use visual effects, but not for their own sake.

Films about books can use special visual effects to depict ideas, supplementing or replacing the use of talking heads. Visual effects shouldn't be used simply for the sake of entertaining--instead, they should be motivated by and harmonious with the underlying argument of the film.

In "A Philosophical Question," for instance, we show a hand digging into the text of a book with a shovel to reveal an image of Justitia underneath as a way to depict our argument that the western legal tradition contains ideas about visual culture that belie its surface focus on language.

Law 10.png                                          From "A Philosophical Question"

Tell stories, but resist journalistic treatment.  

Films about books should be humanistic documents in themselves. Rather than seeking to depict books in the spirit of journalistic documentaries, filmmakers should strive to have their work be placed alongside the books they depict as permanent companions in the interpretive tradition they initiate.

They should take as their model not journalism so much as literary criticism.

Law 11.png              Offering a strong interpretive frame, from "A Philosophical Question."

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                                                                                                                                             Massachusetts has an over two-hundred-year connection with the Rainbow State. Back in the early 1800s, missionaries sailed from Boston to Hawai'i, determined to convert the locals and also to bring the wonders of print to those distant shores. Along with religious fervor, the missionaries also brought a second-hand printing press, kickstarting an impressive outpouring of printed material in Hawai'i.


On November 9, Skinner's Auctioneers and Appraisers welcomes the public to its Boston Gallery at 63 Park Plaza to learn more about the Bay State's early involvement in Hawaiian printing. Elizabeth Watts Pope, curator at the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, will be on hand to discuss Hawaii's printed history and share items from the AAS's collection of over two hundred books, pamphlets, bibliographies, newspapers, and engravings written in Hawaiian and other Polynesian languages. A highlight of the collection includes an 1838 copperplate engraving of Holden, Massachusetts, done by a self-taught Hawaiian engineer who never left his island home. Watts will discuss these and other items, why missionaries excised the letters 'B' and 'D' from the Hawaiian language, and how one of the strongest collections of early Hawaiian printed material wound up in Worcester.


For more information and to RSVP/Register: Skinner Auctioneers & Appraisers

                                                                                                                                                  Image credit: Na Mokpunia o Hawaii Nei. Courtsey AAS. 

Our London correspondent, A. N. Devers, sends this report from INK Fair London's first two days:

A champagne and jazz soiree launched the second annual rare book and art fair, Ink Fair London, last night, a fair founded by Ines Berlin with thirty exhibitors hosting a crowd approaching 1,500 at Two Temple Place, a stunning Gothic mansion and former private home and office of William Waldorf Astor that is now run as The Bull Dog Trust, raising money as a private hire venue and distributing funds to various charities. The fair's intimate and lavish environment provides a wonderful backdrop against which to feature international rare book dealers with an emphasis on exceptional antiquarian and rare books and art sourced from around the world. Pictured below is Kaitlyn Mellini of Worlds End Bookshop.
 
INK Fair copy.jpgI am launching my own business, The Second Shelf, as a "Fresh Face" of the fair, but I took a break from my stand to take in some of the incredible offerings of the other dealers.
 
massey.jpgMy neighbor at the fair, Laura Massey of Alembic Rare Books, who shares my particular interest in books by woman, and women in science in particular, has a rare biographical sketch of scientist Rosalind Franklin and showed off her "Stereoscopic Skin Clinic" from 1910 to many customers. (She is pictured at left doing just that.) Her neighbor, Beaux Books, the design-focused business owned by Clare Trimming, showed an original set drawing for Don Giovanni at the Met by Eugene Berman.
 
Across the room Carl Williams Rare Books offered the true first edition of Yoko Ono's Grapefruit and rare James Joyce material.
 
A pop-up Obstetric Tables by George Spratt (pictured below) is in the center case at Deborah Coltham Rare Books. And her neighbor, Amanda Hall Rare Books, is featuring a breathtaking collection of 241 butterflies in a wooden collector's cabinet.
 
Coltham.jpgInk London communications director, Leo Cadogan, has his own stand and is featuring a secret Jesuit manuscript that was continued after the Jesuits were suppressed in 1775 and poignantly documents the hope that they will return.
 
Otter Bookbinding demonstrated her exceptional skill making bookmarks and exhibited multicolored stenciled linocut decorative prints on unbound sheets circa 1800s by John and Jane Jeffries (pictured below).
 
Otter.jpgAntiquates Fine & Rare Books has writer and mathematician Ada Lovelace's family copy of her father's poems. And a bewitching manuscript too.

                                                                                                                                                                            On offer in the stand of Charlotte Du Rietz Rare Books is the rare first English edition of Rabindranath Tagore's The Parrot's Training (1918) (pictured below).

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Sophie Schneideman Rare Books & Prints spotlights a wonderful range of fine press and rare books including the exceedingly rare first edition of William Blake's Book of Job from 1826.

                                                                                                                                                                                

Justin Croft Antiquarian Books is featuring his new catalogue of the French books of rare book dealer Martin Stone, who passed away last year, including Oscar Wilde's Salome with illustrations by Rene Ben Susan. (More on that here.)
 
Business was brisk, books were slung, and many selfies were taken in the grand stairwell, and there is still a day to go!   

Photos credit: A.N. Devers

Our Bright Young Collectors series continues today with Sherese Francis, of Queens, NYC, who collects literary material from southeast Queens and makes her collection available to others through the J. Expressions mobile library. Francis recently won an honorable mention for her collection in the Honey & Wax book collecting contest.
 
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Where are you from / where do you live? 

I live in Hollis, Queens in New York City.

What did you study at University? What do you do now for an occupation? 

I created my own major at Baruch College, which is part of the City University of New York. It was a combined major of music and journalism/creative writing. I believe I called it Words and Music: From Songwriting to Journalism. I originally was interested in music journalism and possibly being a song lyricist. 

I am currently a freelance writer, author, blogger, workshop facilitator, and literary curator. I know that a lot! Haha! My blog is Futuristically Ancient, which is an afrofuturism-inspired blog, exploring the arts and cultures of the African Diaspora through that lens. I recently published my first chapbook of poetry called Lucy's Bone Scrolls and I facilitate workshops throughout the city. And of course, I run my J. Expressions popup bookshop/mobile library project.

Please introduce us to your book collection. What areas do you collect in? 

My book collection, which is the J. Expressions mobile library, is books and other literary materials from authors and writers who either currently live or use to live in Southeast Queens, NYC area, where I was raised and live now. I have fiction, poetry, non-fiction, zines, letterpress, and handmade books in the collection. 

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How many books are in your collection? 

I have 24 "official" books (which includes zines and a magazine) and about 15 of my own handmade books. 

What was the first book you bought for your collection? 

I've had some of the books before I officially started the collection. I believe the first book I bought that is in the collection is artist Danny Simmons' book of poetry and art called, "I Dreamed My People Were Calling But I Couldn't Find My Way Home."

How about the most recent book? 

The most recent is Cheryl Boyce Taylor's collection of poetry, "Arrival."

And your favorite book in your collection? 

I would say my favorites are Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie's two books, "Dear Continuum" and "Karma's Footsteps" because she inspires me as a fellow poet and writer.

Best bargain you've found? 

When I found out that my friend and artist Damali Abrams had her own poetry book and zine, and she kindly donated them to me to add to my collection.
 
How about The One that Got Away? 

I had wanted to get a copy of Desiree C. Bailey's chapbook In Dirt or Saltwater, which was published by O'Clock Press, but by the time I got around to being able to purchase it, it was already sold out. That was a bummer. 

What would be the Holy Grail for your collection? 

The Holy Grail for my collection would be for me to have an official organization and space to house and showcase this collection in my neighborhood, and use it as a launching pad to grow the community here in Southeast Queens. Places like the Schomburg Center inspire me because it's a library and cultural center where you can learn so much about black history through the diaspora and history of the Harlem neighborhood. I want something similar for my community. 

Who is your favorite bookseller / bookstore? 

Sadly there's not any bookstores in my local community and few in the borough of Queens. There use to be a Barnes and Noble that I would go to in Forest Hills but that closed. So, I travel to various bookstores throughout the city. I would say a couple of my favorites are Bluestockings in the Lower East Side and Sisters Uptown Bookstore in Washington Heights. I like grassroots, community-centered spaces like these and they inspire me to possibly one day create my own. 

What would you collect if you didn't collect books?

Since I love music, especially older music styles, like funk music, I would probably start a record album collection. I love the artistry on a lot of the older album covers and as a writer who does ekphrastic writing (writing inspired by visual art and objects), they would be inspiring to have around. 


Images courtesy of Sherese Francis



















Bookseller Martin Stone, regarded as one of the best book hunters (and guitar players) in modern memory, died nearly a year ago now, but his legend clearly lives on.

                                                                                                                                                              Last week, Booktryst announced its publication of a fine press festschrift, The Remarkable Martin Stone, published in an edition of 150 with contributions from the likes of Iain Sinclair, Marianne Faithful, and Sylvia Beach Whitman. It is being sold by subscription, to ship in December, and expected to sell out.   

And now, debuting tonight at Ink Fair London is a catalogue of Stone's French books, 1873-1925 (download the PDF here) offered by UK bookseller Justin Croft. Unlike most book scouts, Stone kept a large stock of books and never offered them on the Internet; much of what he left is, therefore, fresh to the market, unseen since who knows when.  

According to Croft, "These books are the fruit of several decades of Martin Stone's book hunting through the bookshops, markets, bookfairs and basements of Paris and beyond."

Needless to say, the books are gorgeous. Here are a few of my favorites:

5822a.jpgA first edition of Edmond Haraucourt's L'Effort. La Madone. L'Antéchrist. L'Immortalité. La Fin du monde (Paris, 1894). Copy #118 of 180 on papier velin, with elaborate decorative borders and red silk endpapers. Notes the catalogue: "An elaborate bibliophilic project direct by Octave Uzanne in iconic symbolist style: a collection of four stories, each with a different illustrative scheme." £2,200 ($2,920)

5929.jpgA first edition of Jean Rameau's first collection, Poèmes fantasques (Paris, 1883), illustrated by A. Gambard. One of 100 copies on japon and signed. £500 ($665).

6164.jpgEdgar Allan Poe's Une Descente dans le maelstrom, illustrated by Marc Roux (Paris, 1920). An unnumbered copy, one of 450, illustrated with woodcuts printed in color. The endpaper bears an inscription by the artist. £200 ($265)

Images courtesy of Justin Croft Antiquarian Books

logostacked.png                                                                                                                                             Left Bank Books is back, but without the brick and mortar setup. Erik DuRon and artist Jess Kuronen recently relaunched the Greenwich Village book hub as an online shop with a curated inventory of vintage, collectible and rare materials. Both worked briefly at the old Left Bank Books before it shuttered in 2016. They kindly answered a few questions recently about the relaunch and what it's been like to transition to a digital bookstore.                                                                                                                             

Best of luck to the latest incarnation of Left Bank Books--be sure to visit their website here!

                                                                                                                                                                         What made you decide to relaunch online?

Mostly it was a pragmatic decision. We just don't have the resources yet to open as a brick-and-mortar shop, whereas a website was a scale we could work within creatively at relatively low cost. That said, we want to make the most of it. It's been an interesting experiment, trying to recreate the experience of browsing in a well-appointed used bookshop. Obviously the tactile element is just irreproducible, but hopefully the moment of serendipity when you discover something really cool you didn't know you were looking for but then just have to have is there.

                                                                                                                                       

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What kind of books do you specialize in?

Broadly speaking, books in literature and the arts - antiquarian, modern and contemporary. Jess is an artist and I'm a writer and we're both interested in process. Our inventory reflects that and is geared towards people in creative professions, for whom books are a resource, personally and professionally. The old Left Bank was very much a hybrid used-and-rare bookshop and we want to maintain that, but for all the well-known reasons the sad reality is there's just less of a viable space these days for the kind of general used bookshop I grew up frequenting in the city. Still, it's important to us to be accessible to people who maybe don't necessarily identify themselves as rare book collectors, in terms of price, but also in terms of selection, and how we present our books. Hopefully the material is fresh, in that it's not what you expect to find in a rare bookseller's catalog, or we have something new and insightful to say about it. We want our books to bypass the rational mind that says I don't have room for one more book and speak directly to your reptilian brain.

How's business been since the relaunch?

I won't lie, it's been slow. When the old shop closed in spring 2016 there was a big outpouring of grief and frustration in the neighborhood, so we were pleased when we announced the relaunch at the show of love we got. But at any given point in the day fewer people are likely to "stop by" a website to see what's new, and of course you miss the crucial element of handselling that takes place in-person in a real environment. We've tried to recreate that online, and do a lot of individualized outreach and personal attention to our customers, but there's no substitute for street level contact in a neighborhood like the Village, with all its characters and denizens.

You've been selling books for two decades, were you ever involved with the old LBB?

Yes, both Jess and I each worked at the old Left Bank for a year, under its third and final owner. I had been working independently from home while attending grad school, after having recently left Bauman Rare Books, where I had been a manager and worked for 14 years. Left Bank had been in existence by that point for 24 years, first as Book Leaves on W. 4th St. under its original owner, then as Left Bank on 8th Avenue under its second owner. It had always struggled, but the city was a kinder if not gentler place then and it managed to get by. By the time we got there, though, the challenges were many. In a sense we were brought in to help with a turnaround, and things were improving, but in the end we ran out of time. That's why we want to be deliberate now that we've revived things under our own steam, and try to get it right. It may be next to impossible, but we want to give it a shot because we think a good used and rare bookshop has an important role to play in the cultural life of a city.

What else should our readers know?

Until we can scrape together financing for an open shop, we're planning to do pop-ups, bookfairs, digital catalogs, Instagram, etc. People should visit us for updates and keep a lookout.

"A rather scarce little book, in fine condition with the map," was how Franklin Delano Roosevelt, then governor of New York, described--and inscribed on the book's pastedown--his first edition of William H. Colyer's Sketches of the North River (1838), alongside his name and "Executive Mansion, 1930."

FDR-book-intro.jpgAccording to its seller, the Raab Collection in Ardmore, Pennsylvania, the slim volume derives from the gubernatorial library of FDR, governor of New York from 1929 until he won the US presidential election in 1932. It is an uncommon book, made more uncommon by its provenance: "This is our first time offering a book from FDR's personal library in many years." It is priced at $4,000.

FDR famously hailed from Hyde Park, New York, where his presidential library and museum is now located. He was also a voracious collector. According to the FDR Library, "From an early age he gathered large collections of stamps, ship models, rare books, prints, coins, and drawings. By the time of his election as President, he had amassed one of the nation's finest collections of naval art and impressive collections of Hudson River Valley art and historical prints."

Looks like this is one that got away!  

Image courtesy of Raab Collection

au revoir.JPGIn 2013, Au revoir là-haut (éditions Albin Michel) by Pierre Lamaitre appeared in French bookstores, a sweeping epic chronicling the lives of two surviving combattants of World War I that enthralled readers and critics alike. The book sold 490,000 copies in 2013, earning Lemaitre the prestigious Prix Goncourt and the Prix Femina. In 2015, it was turned into a graphic novel. (Non-French speakers interested in discovering the book will find it translated as The Great Swindle.) On October 25, the film version hits French theaters. If it's anything like the book, it'll be worth seeking out.                                              

Known primarily for his thrillers, Lemaitre took a vastly different literary approach with Au revoir là-haut, choosing instead to examine life in the wake of war while also exploring the sometimes inexplicable bonds of friendship forged during traumatizing events. The story centers around Albert and Edouard, two poilus--the informal term for World War I infantrymen--who soon discover that postwar France can offer nothing to soothe veterans returning from the battlefields with unimaginable physical and emotional traumas. Rejected and excluded by the country they put their lives on the line to save, the unlikely duo turn their bitterness into an audacious scam that exacts sweet, cynical revenge on the country they sacrificed so much to protect.   

                                                                                                                                                                                 "I tried to serve as a sincere and honest intermediary between my contemporaries and those I describe in the book," Lemaitre said during a 2013 interview with RTL. L'Express book reviewer François Busnel called it a "major existential work, a somber and burning requiem that serves up splendidly effective writing like a punch straight in the face."                                                                       
The film's producer Albert Dupontel was a huge fan of the book and envisioned this project along the lines of "a well-executed HBO movie." (In fact, the $22-million dollar budget for Dupontel's movie cost roughly the same as the pilot episode of Martin Scorsese's Boardwalk Empire.) 

Though the trailer is not subtitled, it is a tantalizing morsel for what is sure to be a monumental film. A fascinating exploration of a tumultuous moment in history, Au revoir là-haut may very well hit the literary jackpot of being a success both in print and on screen.

Long before Salem's notorious witch trials in 1692, England experienced its own witchcraft scandal. In 1622, English literary translator Edward Fairfax (c.1580-c.1635) brought to trial six local women following the unexplained and strange illnesses of his three daughters who "spoke of visions and named names" before the youngest died in October 1621. Fairfax wrote up his case in a manuscript titled A Discourse of Witchcrafte as it was Acted in the Family of Mr. Edward Fairfax of Fuistone.    

Witch.jpeg"I present the Xtian Reader a narration of Witchcraft of which I am a Woeful Witness, & so I can best report it, read this without vindicatory passion, & in reading let thy descretion proceed thy judgement."

A copy of the accusatory manuscript made by eighteenth-century painter and antiquarian Thomas Beckwith will be on exhibit and for sale at INK Fair London next week, offered by Tom Lintern-Mole of Antiquates Fine & Rare Books. It is priced at £7,500 ($10,000). The perfect Halloween treat, you say?  
 
Fairfax's legal case (and a second) ultimately collapsed. His manuscript was published under the title Daemonologia in 1882.

Image courtesy of Antiquates.