The Care and Traning of Your Pet R̶o̶c̶k̶ Book
Hello students, this is our course wordpress. During our first weeks of class, you are going to select a book or bookish object from Wesleyan’s library and archives. You are going to adopt this book as your “pet” and get to know it throughout the semester. I want you to really get to know this … Read more
After this book was printed in 1546, we have a long time in which we don’t know where it was. Inside the front cover, we do have some information. We have a newspaper notice, which someone wrote with a red pencil that it was “Avril 1927.” I don’t speak French, but I know enough that … Read more
The Twelve Articles was created by Jeffery Morin. It’s a remediation of The Twelve Accusations of Joan of Arc. In this artbook, Morin compares the trials of a man dealing with his AIDS diagnosis to the trials of Joan of Arc. The pictures are what drew me to this book. As a printmaker myself, I … Read more
After pondering and speculating about The First of May it’s time to think about what kind of life this book had. The binding of the copy Wesleyan has seems in pretty good shape — even though there are a few scratches on the leather cover and acidic (?) spots in most of the pages. According … Read more
My Pet Book’s afterlife Reading over my past blog posts, I recognize how wheedled I’ve become by the topic of death. So I’m glad that the topic of this blog is afterlife. The afterlife of my pet book Death Masks. It looks brand new. It helps that the book was only recently made, published in … Read more
The afterlife of a 1950’s cookbook In the past few months, I have grown so close to my 1950’s Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. I have poured over its pages, inhaled its scents, and leafed through its tattered pages, all while consuming the messages hidden within. This cookbook has taken on an entirely new life … Read more
First and foremost, I’d like to take a moment to acknowledge how creative and cool Common Threads is once more. I’m glad I went with my gut and chose this book to adopt for the semester because it truly was fun to study and write about. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time with Common Threads … Read more
As I covered much of the ground intended for this blog post in my first blog post – the 19th-century replacement cover, the damage done to the inner pages, the degradation of the spine, etc. – I’ve decided to focus instead on the more abstract version of the afterlife for my pet book, beginning with … Read more
Poe, The Raven (1884, Dore´ Illustrations) Greg’s Fourth Blog Post November 27, 2023 Gustave Doré did not write “The Raven” but illustrated it. “The Raven” is a narrative poem and Doré, created illustrations for “The Raven” that were included in this deluxe edition of Poe’s work published by Harper & Brothers in 1884. Harper & … Read more
My pet book changes every time I open it. Which leads me to consider how that may be true about every book.
When I first explored this 1906 edition of Peter Pan Kensington Gardens, I was awed by her nearly pristine condition. Despite being 117 years old, she has no wormholes, no dog-eared folds, only one annotated page, and only one rip (at an inner-margin) in over 120 pages. Her pages aren’t brittle, and yellowing is sparse … Read more