“…senseless atoms, playing and toying up and down, without any care or thought, and from eternity trying all manner of tricks, conclusions and experiments, were at length (they know not how) taught, and by the necessity of things themselves, as it were, driven…so that though...
1831 edition illustrations by Theodor von Holst “The day of my departure at length arrived.” Title: Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus Author: Mary W. Shelley The National Library (Third) Edition; First Illustrated Edition Published: London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, 1831 Pages: 200; Introduction and Preface included. Call Number: PR5397 F7 1831 Mary...
A Black, E white, I red, U green, O blue: vowels, I will someday speak of your unseen births: A, black corset bristling with glittering flies That buzz around cruel smells, Gulfs of shadow; E, innocent vapours and tents, Lances of proud glaciers, white kings, frissons of an inflorescence; I, crimsons,...
Past cure I am, now Reason is past care, And frantic-mad with evermore unrest; My thoughts and my discourse as madmen’s are, At random from the truth vainly expressed; For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright, Who art as black as hell, as dark as night. Duet Marie C....
“A catt may look on a king” Lexicon Tetraglotton, an English-French-Italian-Spanish… James Howell (1594? – 1666) London: Printed by J.G. for Samuel Thompson, 1660 First and only edition James Howell, born in Wales and educated at Oxford, began his literary career in 1640 with the political allegory, Dendrologia: Dodona’s...
“Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before” THE RAVEN Edgar Allan Poe (1909-1949) Easthampton, MA: Cheloniidae Press, 1980 This is the first book from Alan James Robinson and his Cheloniidae Press. Text is hand-set and printed by Harold McGrath in Bruce Rogers’ 24pt. Centaur type in...
“Where books are burned, in the end people will be burned too.” — Heinrich Heine, 1823 Celsius 233 Philip Zimmermann Tuscon, AZ: Spaceheater Editions, 2015 N7433.4 Z55 C45 2015 From the artist: I started doing research on the history of book-burning after seeing a video posted by the Islamic State/Daesh...
“We have all our elephants to see.” Empire Builders Carol Inderieden and Chandler O’Leary Tacoma, WA: Anagram Press, 2015 N7433.4 I52 E47 2015 From the authors’ essay: “To see the elephant was to embark on a quest for riches and prosperity…The elephant is an illusion, an impossible promise like a...
“It is a prayer for the rebirth of a way of writing with breath.” CHANCCANI QUIPU Cecilia Vicuña New York: Granary Books, 2012 Quipu, or knotted cords, encoded the spoken language of the Inca, representing both single sounds and whole words, and was used as a form of communication...
“Animals should not use human language.” Alice’s adventures in wonderland… Lewis Carroll (1832-1898) London: Macmillan and Co., 1866 First published edition Charles Lutwidge Dodgson’s now-famous Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was intended solely for Alice Liddell and her two sisters. Dodgson made the story up to entertain the bored children...
