An educational and informational site about rare, old and antiquarian books.
Nothing can be as fascinating in the world of exploration and discovery as some of the early Arctic voyages. Still one of the last frontiers on earth, the region that spans the Arctic Ocean and covers land areas in parts of Canada, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, and the United States (Alaska), has attracted numerous explorers […]
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Not long after Johannes Gutenberg invented an improved movable type mechanical printing system in Europe around 1450, the first woodcut book illustration was printed in 1461. Woodcuts can be easily printed together with movable type because both are relief-printed (a process by which protruding surface faces of the printing plate or block are inked; recessed […]
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How often do you discover a book of interest in a bricks and mortar bookstore and, instead of buying it on the spot, you complete the purchase of that same book online? According to a recent survey by the Codex Group, approximately a quarter of all books purchased online fall into that category. Bookshops have […]
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Before surrealism was officially founded in 1924 when André Breton wrote Le Manifeste du Surréalisme, a group of young writers that included Paul Éluard, André Breton, Louis Aragon and Philippe Soupault, were active in the Dadaist movement. It was during this time that French poet Paul Éluard, in collaboration with German Dadaist Max Ernst, produced […]
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Ah, wouldn’t it be nice if every book you came across contained a set of standard information no matter who the publisher is? It would be nice if antiquarian books contained a page similar to the one contained in modern editions on the copyright page, with the edition, printing, state, copyright date, date of publication, […]
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Last weekend I had the opportunity to visit a magnificent French style chateau which is a contemporary English museum, none other than the Bowes Museum in the town of Barnard Castle, Teesdale, County Durham, England. The exhibition that drew me in is called Dreamscapes, and it will run through the summer, exploring photographer Tim Walker’s […]
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Contemporary art can be alluring for investors. Prices are soaring and the traditional cheaper alternative of investing in art works that are printed, bound, and widely offered in the form of a limited edition book, are not what they used to be. Such editions printed on better quality paper and featuring fine illustrations or even […]
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Can a first edition of a rare book be less significant than a later edition? Of course it can. What follows is a good example of such an “anomaly.” Bibliophiles of illustrated books often argue that the art contained in illustrated books is not being viewed as comparable in appeal to wall art. They call […]
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