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Vintage Book Clocks Spoof School Spirit, Sex, Guns, Space, Drugs - And Meat
By Stephen J. GertzVintage Book Clocks, the Venice, California designer and purveyor of literary timepieces, has added to its catalog a few chronometers with slightly cracked attitude. Not every book...
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"One Of The Most Beautiful Books Ever Created" Reaps $415,937 At Sotheby's
by Stephen J. GertzCENDRARS, Blaise & DELAUNAY, Sonia. La Prose du Transsibérian et de la Petite Jehanne de France.Paris: Editions des Hommes Nouveaux, 1913.Box (above) by Paul Bonet after Sonia...
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The Original Guide To Health and Wellness, From Iraq
By Stephen J. GertzIn 1531, the first printed edition of what had originally been an eleventh century Arabic guide to good health was published.Purification [enema].The book, Tacuini Sanitatis (Tables...
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Unicorn Recipe Discovered In Lost Medieval Cookbook Found In British Library
By Stephen J. GertzDetail of a unicorn on the grill in Geoffrey Fule's cookbook, England, mid-14th century (London, British Library, MS Additional 142012, f. 137r)."Taketh one unicorne," marinade with...
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The Ice Capades For Printers
by Stephen J. GertzOn February 5, 1814, a curious broadside, heretofore unrecorded, was published heralding printing on ice. In retrospect and out of context, it appeared as if a new process for...
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Unique 19th C. Photo Album of Barack Obama's Family Surfaces
By Stephen J. GertzTomorrow, Friday April 6, 2012, the New York Times will run a story about an amazing find, a family album, c. 1870, containing albumin carte-de-viste photographs, and tintypes of...
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"The Best Book Fair In The World" Returns To New York
By Stephen J. GertzThe New York Antiquarian Book Fair, now in its 52d year, returns to the Park Avenue Armory April 12-15, 2012.Sponsored by the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America (ABAA)...
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Death To The Fascist Insect!
By Stephen J. GertzIt's Death To The Fascist Insect That Preys Upon The Life Of The People Day at Booktryst. On this day thirty-eight years ago, Patty Hearst was on the lam with the Symbionese...
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Three Strange And Beautiful 16th Century Fantasy Maps, Another From 1617
By Stephen J. GertzMUNSTER, Sebastian. [Europe depicted as a Queen]. Basel, c. 1580. German edition. Colored. woodcut (260 x 160mm). MCC I: 6.During the late sixteenth century, a few cartographers...
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Booktryst Takes A Break
By Stephen J. GertzBooktryst takes a break this week to be shocked, say hello to Mummy and report on the bomb in our house, consider the terrible price of Rochelles's bigger boobs, and continue our...
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The Story Of Nobody, By Somebody, Illustrated By Someone
By Stephen J. GertzThe Original Story Of O.Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit(From Nothing Comes Nothing).Since Nothing is with Nothing fraughtThen Nobody must spring from naught."Nobody knows the trouble I've...
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A 19th Century Emily Post On Laughing Gas
by Stephen J. GertzWhen a book purporting to be a guide to proper etiquette presents with a titlepage depicting a gentleman hogging all the chairs in the room as he tips backward on one, his feet upon...
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Six Sacred Books In Spectacular Bindings
By Stephen J. GertzDario Ecclesiatico Para o Reino de Portugal, Principalmente Para A Guide de Lisboa, Para o Anno de 1822.Lisboa [Lisbon]: Imprensa Nacional, n.d. [c.1821].A small cache of Bibles,...
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A Spelunker In The Cave Of Poverty
By Stephen J. GertzIn 1715, Lewis Theobald, a British lawyer and budding poet with literary ambitions just beginning to be realized through translations of classical Greek dramas, stood at the entrance...
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Lincoln's Opera Glasses From Assassination Night Come To Auction
By Stephen J. GertzThe opera glasses owned and held by Abraham Lincoln at the moment of his assassination on April 14, 1865 at Ford's Theatre in Washington D.C. are being auctioned during an online...
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Magnificent 15th C. Illuminated Hebrew Manuscript Estimated $540K - $800K
By Stephen J. GertzCantor pointing to The Book of Life, opening Yom Kippur.A mahzor, or Jewish holiday prayerbook, an illuminated manuscript in Hebrew on vellum from Tuscany (likely Florence), c....
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The First Novel On Free Blacks And Race Relations In The North (1857)
By Stephen J. GertzThe book which now appears before the public may be of interest in relation to a question which the late agitation of the subject of slavery has raised in many thoughtful minds;...
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Hey, Rare Book Guy! Is It Erotica, Curiosa, Or Pornography? (May be NSFW)
By Stephen J. GertzHey Rare Book Guy!I was looking through a rare book catalog from the early 1980s. The dealer subtitled his business, Erotica, Curiosa, and Sexology. What's curiosa? What's the...
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Meet "The Reader," A Drama In Lithography
By Stephen J. GertzTOBIAS, Abraham Joel (1913-1996). The Reader. New York: Works Progress Administration, 1935-43. Lithograph. Image size (21 1/4 x 15 3/4 in; 54 x 40 cm). .Painter, lithographer,...
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Read This House!
By Stephen J. GertzAn anonymous author’s novel written on the wallsof an abandoned house in Chongqing, China.The writing's on the wall: Amazon won't be selling this book. Yet perhaps the innovative new...
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