Bibliophilia

Sometimes I dream about buying more books.  But then I'd have to dream about buying more shelves.

Bibliophilia by Jellyby on Polyvore.com

Why do they keep making books more and more beautiful?  Grrr.

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Call me the Angelina Jolie of words.

Thanks to NPR, I discovered that there are poor, abandoned words out there who need our help.

So in the spirit of giving, I adopted a word.  (Yes, I could have adopted a child or a cow or a tree, but adopting a word is free, and I'm cheap like that.)

Anyway, my word is pamphagous, meaning "eating or consuming everything."  Fitting for me, no?  I'll be using it early and often, rescuing it from a life of obscurity by sprinkling it in my everyday speech, giving it shelter and sustenance in my blog.

Who knows, if it behaves itself and all works out, I might adopt another.  In the interim, there are other words that need your help, so go to the word pound now and save the words.

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Book 'em or wear 'em

Although I quit my Ph.D. and am no longer writing about old books, I can still wear them, right?  Especially when they are miniature, like these whimsical book necklaces handmade from vintage leathers and recycled materials.

Do the Strand Necklace

Alas, Anthropologie is selling these tiny books at a big, big price.

Bookworm Necklace

But Peg and Awl -- who made the pieces for Anthro -- also sells these darling creations at their Etsy store, The Black Spot Books.

Autumnal Library Necklace

It's $350, but still almost $100 cheaper without the Anthro mark-up.

Antique Postcard Book Necklace

The single book necklaces are a bit more reasonable at $40.  It's tres adorable, no?

Mini Book Earrings

Or wear the books on your ears instead.  They're closer to your noggin, so all the book learning enters more quickly through osmosis.

Will you be reading or wearing your reading materials today?

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I don't know whether to laugh or cry

As some of you know, I recently quit a Ph.D. program after toiling in misery for 6+ years.  I've been meaning to write a series of posts about this, but I don't think I'm quite ready yet.

In the interim, there's this video:

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On Traces

My Aunt Cheryl, who is an avid reader of this blog (hi Auntie Cheryl!), came to my rescue by sending me a recipe for Blintz Souffle from Marlene Sorosky's Cooking for Entertaining.  What I particularly love about the recipe, aside from its obvious deliciousness, is that she sent me a pdf of the actual page from her copy of the cookbook -- stains, splatters, and all.

This may seem strange, but I feel like the recipe is going to be that much more tasty and special because it's been made so many times before by her (as is obvious by he well-loved appearance of the page).  If you flip through the cookbooks in our kitchen, you can similarly tell how many times we've made a particular recipe by looking at the condition of the binding, the number of chocolate fingerprints or oil splotches, etc.

For some, the most valued books in their collection are those that are in pristine condition.  I have a friend -- a literature professor and voracious reader -- who never marks up his books.  In fact, he is careful to never even break the spine.

For me, however, a book doesn't become an object worth keeping unless it's written on, broken in, and dog-eared.  Then it transforms from a mere thing to a repository of memories -- literally, a souvenir (French for "to remember"). Indeed, there's something so lovely about opening up a book and encountering an old version of yourself in it.  Seeing the underlining, marginalia, and doodles reminds me that I've experienced this already before and that -- still -- the present encounter with the book is a new experience, a chance to go on a tangent, to learn something more, or simply to get reacquainted with an old friend.

Beyond that, though, a book with stains, marks, and tears is also a book that itself has a life, a past.  Even if I wasn't the one to mark it up originally, I am nonetheless aware that the book has a history.  And when I flip through its pages, it's reading me into a shared experience with others.  So when I make the blintz recipe, it'll feel like my Aunt Cheryl and I were able to share in Yom Kippur together, even though she's far away in Canada.

This love of a book's traces is why I'm so reluctant to get a Kindle or rely on an eBook reader.  It's also why I always keep print-outs of any online recipe I make.

What do your books -- cookbooks, fiction, etc. -- look like?  Are you interested in the new and pristine or the old and weathered?

P.S. We were watching a new episode of "Hoarders" last night (I'm obsessed with that show), and it struck me that there's a fine line between my love of objects with history and the kind of fetishization that leads to hoarding.  Perhaps the difference between the two is that hoarders fear that the memories will be lost without being associated with objects -- that by tossing a wrapper, you're throwing away the experience of sharing a snack with a loved one -- while "souveniring" (or whatever it is that I do) assumes that objects can accumulate experience, that not only do they bear traces of the past, they also can serve as portals to shared and future experiences? Or maybe we've all got a bit of a hoarding instinct inside of us, and it's just a matter of the degree to which we're able to control it or to channel it in healthier directions?

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"Beginning, End"

I came across this breathtaking story by Jessica Soffer in Granta.  It made me teary.  I'm such a sap . . .

Photo of my grandparents

New Voices | Online Only | Granta Magazine

"Beginning, End" by Jessica Soffer

You were born. You named yourself. You walked your turtle. You went to school. You had dirty feet. You lay in a field. You piled into the Vanagan. You carried signs. You grew long legs. You met someone. You were just a kid. You didn’t keep it. You got into college. You moved east. You shaved your armpits. You took up jogging. You discovered hairspray. You crossed your legs.

I saw you at that party, holding a rock in your fingers. I popped a mint. I cleared my throat. I had pennies in my loafers. I ate red meat. I could change. I told you, I would change. I knew by your face, you weren’t so sure. I was drunk. I wasn’t your type. I kissed you on the Lakefill. I lifted a lash off your face. I didn’t tell you, my parents belonged to a country club. I had season tickets. I thought, you looked so clean, you smelled like stems.

I walked behind you. You led the rallies. I lost my mother. You rubbed my back.

We got a place. We read a lot. We rescued a dog. You worked at a shelter. I was a terrible handyman. My father called friends. We moved to the city. We ordered in. We picked up dry-cleaning. We hailed cab after cab. We were promoted. We hardly saw each other. I drank too much. You wouldn’t kiss me. You said I was my father. I stood there, half-listening, sick of your hoping. You said, you weren’t angry just tired.

We got a bigger apartment. We ran along the pier. We ate organic. We tried for a baby. We tried again. You took hormones. You pushed me away. I moved out. I slept with our dermatologist. You buried our dog. You forgave me. You cut your hair. I moved back in. We almost adopted. We went to counseling. We got a puppy. We held hands on the bird trail and the puppy scampered ahead.

We wore pyjama sets. We saw Spanish films. We took our time at the market. We got a stationary bike. We feared the wind. We helped each other dress. We went to Tuscany. You wanted to stay. I bought you an MG. You named it Brando. I got mugged in broad daylight. I shattered a kneecap. We had to wonder.

We bought some land. It gave us hope. I loved the farm stands. We moved in April. You bought second-hand books. You painted the bathrooms. I planted tomatoes. We sat on the porch. We had soil in our fingernails. We let it be. We reminisced. We didn’t miss it. We left the door unlocked. You found a lump. I took you to the doctor. You had to drive. I blamed the hormones. I blamed that commune. I blamed soy. I blamed the sun. You took long baths. Your hair fell like feathers. I did the laundry. I managed your pills. I spoon-fed you yogurt. You asked for nothing. You gripped my sweaters. I didn’t sleep. I watched you breathing. You were quiet as a plant. You were the same but with a different face.

I always knew, you said, that I’d go first. You weren’t looking for an answer. I couldn’t say it anyhow. I couldn’t commit you to it. You were a shell.

Now, I think we should have adopted. We should have stayed in the city. We should have made more friends. This house is too big. You picked all the colors. Your earrings hang from a lamp. Your socks stiffen in the hamper. Your bookmark stops midway through. I sleep with your wallet. It sticks to my cheek like dead skin. Still. I try to walk every morning. I make big portions and freeze them. I donate to our college. I’ve been meaning to volunteer. I’ve been avoiding classical music. The best hours are at night when I can’t be sure if I’m dreaming.

Just the other day, I was moving the dust. The house was whipped by thunder. I covered my head. My arms were wet wood. I didn’t think of God. I got onto the floor. Before, I’d sat here like this. You were falling asleep. You put your hand on my shoulder. Isn’t it something, you asked. I knew what you meant.

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Lolita, light of my life, inspiration for bad covers.

Every once in a while, I'm reminded that I really love books -- that while the horrible English Ph.D. has all sucked away the joy of the insides of many a great book, at the very least there's still the fabulous outside, the tangible, material artifact of the book itself.

John Bertram, a Nabokov aficionado, just announced the results of his Lolita cover design contest on his blog, Venus Febriculosa.  While waiting for chocolate chip cookies to bake up this afternoon, I perused the entries.

Bertram's favorite was this entry from Lyuba Haleva of Bulgaria:

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I dig the wings ("Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, exhibit number one is what the seraphs, the misinformed, simple, noble-winged seraphs, envied."), though I'm not sure I love the art nouveau quality of the lettering and graphics.

My favorites included:

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This submission by Derek McCalla neatly and lyrically summarizes the book in a single image, no?

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This cover, by Aleksander Bak, is suggestive without being graphic.  And I love me a good visual double entendre.

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I was drawn to this cover by Justin Chen, possibly because it reminds me of something Coralie Bickford-Smith might have created.  I would love it more if, instead of girls' heads (too literal, though one could argue that it plays up the multiple permutations of a fantasy Lolita in Humbert's head), he would have used butterflies.

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This cover by Ralph Burkhardt grabbed me because of its visual pop, but also because the rorschach blot (is it a butterfly or the public bone or something else?) does a nice job of instantiating the novel's theme/demand of interpretation.

The submissions that I was most fascinated by, though, were the ones that were just. plain. wrong.  Wrong in so many ways.  Like this one:

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Ew. Ew. Ew. Ew. Ew.  And ew.

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This one makes me laugh.  Word of advice for those aspiring to win a book cover design contest: you might want to read the book.

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This one, aside from having nothing whatsoever to do with Lolita, reminds me of the airbrushed "art" you see in Vietnamese nail salons.  For some reason, it also reminds me of Lisa Frank notebooks from sixth grade.

Okay, let's discuss this one:

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I have mixed feelings about this.  I want to like it.  But it repulses me.  Sort of like Humbert Humbert, I suppose.

Did you take a look at the entries?  Which were your favorites?

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