May 18, 2005
Sound the Death Knell (Again) for Good Old-Fashioned Book Publishing
Walt Crawford an information scientist (and past president of LITA) of note and publisher of the great web-distributed journal Cites & Insights has recently started a weblog.
So far, I have really enjoyed Walt at Random. At great personal risk of censure, I'm going to commit the Walt identified faux pas of metablogging and point to this recent post of his concerning the oft' forecast imminent demise of traditional book publishing. It seems to me that if on the one hand, experts tell us that the established model of book publishing isn't working in our new era of e-books and internet piracy, while on the other it's failing to fail, then instead of finding new publishing models perhaps we should find new experts.
December 13, 2004
Rings of (Nerd) Power
Some poor soul was brave enough to post a LOTR related question to AskMetafilter and I just had to represent.
June 01, 2004
I miss typography
This is what I'm talking about:
http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=0001OR&topic_id=1&topic=
I miss Rare Book Bibliography, and literary circles and handpresses. The Fu Crew needs to put together a compendium and give a reading. I know every single one of you either writes or draws.
And, yes I am extremly jealous of McSweeney's. Have you seen their latest comic book volume?
March 01, 2004
Booklists!
As I expressed here I am jonesin' to get my booklists up on the site and browsable (searchable?) by you, the interested public.
As the author of the dijalog lifestyle article at xml.com so eloquently pointed out, our books and media collections are neither entirely digital nor entirely analog. Appropriately, neither are the various and sundry lists of these collections entirely one or the other.
I present to you the first of my many lists. This is my circulation report from the MIT SFS Library. It's a dijalog list. Originally analog, presented to you in convenient digital form. You can find it in the identifier section of my website. Note the repeated borrowings of a few select books. This pattern represents my attempts to get The Kenj to read these books. I think she only actually finished The Once and Future King.
Well, I'm all geeked out for the day.
February 27, 2004
The Geek Wedding
An excerpt from an email communication between bride and groom concerning choice of wedding cakes and font-face for invitation:
No comparison, really. Except, of course, in cost ($56)...
But really gorgeous.
I've called a few cake places. I had been imagining a cake that looked like stacked books, but that's custom and gets pricy (at least few hundred more than the $400 budgeted). I've found a place, however, that does an opened-book cake (like the kind that has a cheesy message written on it), for $250 or so. Is it worth being a stickler on this sort of thing?
We can talk more tomorrow...
Kendra
At 03:25 PM 2/27/2004 -0500, you wrote:
This is what I'm gonna, what I've been looking for for awhile.
The baskerville punches and matrices were lost shortly after baskerville's death, then rediscoverd much later and given to the Cambridge Press. Many modern typesetters have made digital versions, all more or less altering the spirit of the original to meet current sensibilities. Isaac Moore made a nice imitation for the Fry Foundry not long after Baskerville became famous. Until now, that variation, called Baskerville Old Face (you used to occasionally get it with MS Word) was the closest you could get to the way baskerville's type actually looked on paper 250 years ago.
This guy, Lars, finally has given me exactly what I wanted, an electronic version of exactly what Baskerville was using to print his great folio bible (or at least as close as I'll ever get).
The Baskerville 1757 type http://www.fountain.nu/catalogue/baskerville1757.asp
About the Baskerville Old Face
http://www.linotype.com/10825/baskervilleefoldface-font.html
At linotype you can compare Old Face to other modern baskerville versions. The difference is immediately, glaringly obvious to me. Try comparing it to the other EF Baskervilles.
http://www.linotype.com/117/baskervilleef-family.html
Rob
Oh yeah, we're book people.
Do You Live the Dijalog Lifestyle?
By now it should come as no surprise to all 12 of you that regularly read these pages that I pay attention to what goes on at xml.com.
And now it seems xml.com is paying attention to what goes on at metametadata.net (with a little help)
Kendall Clark has begun a new column in which he seems to have drawn a perfect picture of me and wants to discuss it in depth.
I was even moved to comment on the column and steer folks back here to share in the metametameta craziness.
Reading the column I'm reminded of Yellow River's obsession with his ipod and the stacks and stacks of cds he's got all around his desk.
February 10, 2004
La Belle Dame Sans Merci
So I'm reading this Amber series of sword and sorcerey books by Roger Zelazny.
This fact is not so important to this log except as background. In the fifth book, The Courts of Chaos, I came across this passage:
I finished my wine. She moved to pour me more and I stayed her hand.
She looked up at me. I smiled.
"You almost persuaded me," I said.
Then I closed her eyes with kisses four, so as not to break the charm, and I went and mounted Star. The sedge was not withered, but he was right about the no birds. Hell of a way to run a railroad, though.
"Goodbye, Lady."
This is an allusion to the poem La Belle Dame Sans Merci by John Keats. In making this allusion Zelazny is not drawing any comparison between the characters in the two works, not by allegory or simile. Rather he is intimating that they are one and the same person, who happened to enter into the experiences, and therefore stories, of both authors.
This device falls squarely into the Tolkein tradition of adding depth to a myth by having a character make reference to even older myths. Of course Tolkien wrote his own older myths, Zelazny here borrows one. Keats borrowed this myth from older sources when he sat to write his poem. Even Tolkein did some borrowing of his own, basing material for both his oldest and his youngest layers on existing Scandanavian and Germanic folklore.
I like this device because it either, allows me to feel smart becuase I know what he's talking about, or it gives me a new avenue of research. Tolkein would do a better job because he wouldn't rely on his reader being well-read to understand the paragraph, rather he would adapt the bit of folklore to make sense within his story and allow his audience to decide whether or not they thought there was some real bit of myth behind it and were interested in further research (you bet your sweet bippy I am!).
I happen to know about La Belle Dame Sans Merci through my expereince working at the Houghton Library.
Le Belle Dame Sans Merci is a ballad Keats wrote based on a medieval song about a femme fatale. A reworking/remaking of an old myth the way Tolkien would have done it. Follow the link to a very good introduction.
Keats left two finished versions of the poem. Naturally, critics differ about which one is better.
You can decide for yourself:
Manuscript Published
I I
Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms, Ah, what can ail thee, wretched wight,
Alone and palely loitering? Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake, The sedge is wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing. And no birds sing.
II II
Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms, Ah, what can ail thee, wretched wight,
So haggard and so woe-begone? So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full, The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done. And the harvest's done.
III III
I see a lily on thy brow, I see a lily on thy brow,
With anguish moist and fever-dew, With anguish moist and fever dew;
And on thy cheeks a fading rose And on thy cheek a fading rose
Fast withereth too. Fast withereth too.
IV IV
I met a lady in the meads, I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful - a faery's child, Full beautiful - a faery's child;
Her hair was long, her foot was light, Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild. And her eyes were wild.
V V
I made a garland for her head, I set her on my pacing steed,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone; And nothing else saw all day long,
She looked at me as she did love, For sideways would she lean, and sing
And made sweet moan. A faery's song.
VI VI
I set her on my pacing steed, I made a garland for her head,
And nothing else saw all day long, And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
For sidelong would she bend, and sin She look'd at me as she did love,
A faery's song. And made sweet moan.
VII VII
She found me roots of relish sweet, She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna-dew, And honey wild, and manna dew;
And sure in language strange she said - And sure in language strange she said -
'I love thee true'. 'I love thee true.'
VIII VIII
She took me to her elfin grot, She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she wept and sighed full sore, And there she gazed, and sighed deep,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes And there I shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four. So kiss'd to sleep.
IX IX
And there she lulled me asleep And there we slumber'd on the moss,
And there I dreamed - Ah! woe betide! - And there I dream'd - Ah! woe betide!
The latest dream I ever dreamt The latest dream I ever dream'd
On the cold hill side. On the cold hill side.
X X
I saw pale kings and princes too, I saw pale kings, and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they al Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried - 'La Belle Dame sans Merci They cried - 'La Belle Dame sans Merci
Hath thee in thrall!' Hath thee in thrall!'
XI XI
I saw their starved lips in the gloam, I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide, With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here, And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill's side. On the cold hill side.
XII XII
And this is why I sojourn here And this is why I sojourn here,
Alone and palely loitering, Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake, Though the sedge is wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing. And no birds sing.
What makes the manuscript version of this poem special for me is that he wrote it out in a letter to his brother George (who was living in St. Louis, Missouri). In the letter he pokes fun at himself saying:
Why four kisses -- you will way -- why four? Because I wish to restrain the headlong impetuosity of my Muse -- she would have fain said "score" without hurting the rhyme -- but we must temper the imagination as the critics say with judgment. I was obliged to choose an even number that both eyes might have fair play: and to speak truly I think two apiece quite sufficient. Suppose I had said seven; there would have been three and a half apiece -- a very awkward affair -- and well got out of on my side --
Now, the Houghton Library has the largest collection of Keats material in the world, and has dedicated one room in its building to the collection. There you can find, as I have, the very letter mentioned above. Reading this as an undergraduate and enjoying the ballad in Keats' own hand was one of the main joys of my Harvard experience. It is no wonder that I became a librarian.
And if you're all interested I can arrange a tour of the library, including the Keats collection, through the Keeper of the Printed Book at the Houghton Library (Imagine that's the title of your job, Keeper of the Printed Book, as if you had all of the output of the western intellectual tradition in your care).
If you want, you too can see these words in Keats' own hand with your own eyes.
And, if you really want to know why I became a librarian its so I can one day be called Keeper of something.